Bishop Basil Meeking (1929-2020): Requiescat in Pace

NLM has learned of the death of the Most Rev. Basil Meeking, Emeritus Bishop of Christchurch, New Zealand, who was for many years a staunch supporter of the usus antiquior, which he celebrated frequently. Although nowadays pontifical ceremonies are becoming (relatively) common, Bishop Meeking was well ahead of the curve in that regard. For example, he did pontifical Holy Week ceremonies in Melbourne for many, many years (the photo to the left is from 2010).

He actively supported the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer (Transalpine Redemptorists), the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, and the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, among others. The traditional movement in New Zealand stands greatly in his debt.

On one occasion, Bishop Meeking wrote a kind note to me about an NLM article; his comments indicated that this was a blog he read with some regularity, which is gratifying to know. It edified me that the particular article he wanted to have as a Word document was the Examination of Conscience based on the Rule of St. Benedict (here). He also expressed his agreement with the content of “Cantate Domino Canticum Novum: A Statement on the Current Situation of Sacred Music,” published in nine languages in 2017.

Meeking was ordained a priest in 1953. From 1963 to 1966, he studied at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome, following which he was appointed to the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity in Rome, where he served for eighteen years. He was appointed as Bishop of Christchurch by Pope John Paul II on 30 March 1987 and resigned the see on 15 December 1995. Meeking died in Christchurch on 11 June 2020, aged 90, after what was reported as a recent period of ill-health. (Information culled from Wikipedia; to read more and see a number of photographs, visit the diocesan archives.)

It is heartening to read that, in addition to the usual funeral Mass on Wednesday 17 June at 11am at St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, 373 Manchester Street, the diocese is also announcing on its website a 7:00pm “Vigil Requiem Mass in the Extraordinary Form” on Tuesday 16 June at the same cathedral.

Given his great devotion to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, it is highly fitting that His Excellency passed to his eternal reward on the feast of Corpus Christi. The Church needs many more humble and generous servants like Bishop Meeking. May it please Our Lord to grant him eternal rest, and to raise up more shepherds with a heart for Catholic tradition.

From FSSP New Zealand

From diocesan archives

At a priestly ordination for the Transalpine Redemptorists

Receiving the first blessing of the priest

Continue Reading this Article. . .

Requiescat in Pace

Servais Pinckaers, O.P.
Professor of Moral Theology
Université de Fribourg

Through the kindness of a reader, I was informed this morning of a notice posted by Fr. Michael Sherwin, O.P., a priest of my Western Dominican Province and instructor in Moral Theology in the Dominican Faculty at Fribourg, that Fr. Servais Pinckaers, O.P., perhaps the formost interpreter of the moral theology of St. Thomas Aquinas, passed away this past Sunday, April 6, in the early morning. He was a distinguished Thomist and a great teacher. The Order and Catholic Moral Theology will miss him greatly.

Fr. Pinchaers was born in Liege, Belgium, in 1925. He entered the Order of Preachers in 1945. He was ordained in 1951 and received a Ph.D. from the Angelicum (where I am currently living) in 1952. He taught moral theology from 1952 to 1965 in Belgium, and from 1965 to 1973 was in pastoral ministry at Leige. In 1980, he began teaching at Fribourg in Switzerland, becoming a full professor of moral theology in 1980, and a senior member of the faculty of theology from 1989 until 1991. He was a member of the International Theological Commission from 1992 until his death.

His publications are many. His L'Evangile et la Morale (1989), in English as The Sources of Christian Ethics (1995) and its shorter version, La Morale Catholique (1991), are central works in 20th-century moral theology. The later has been published as Morality: The Catholic View, with a preface by Alasdair MacIntyre, in translation by Fr. Michael Sherwin, O.P., from St. Augustine's Press. It is a good introduction to his work and can be found on Amazon.com. Other works in English include: The Pursuit of Happiness: Living the Beatitudes (1998), and the collection of his essays, The Pinckaers Reader : Renewing Thomistic Moral Theology (2005). Before his death, Fr. Pinchaers had just finished a textual analysis and commentary for the first five questions of the Prima Secundae for the second edition of the Revue des Jeunes' bilingual edition of the Summa Theologiae.

Fr. Pinckaers has served on several Roman commissions, including the Commission that wrote the Catechism of the Catholic Church, contributing to the moral section, and the preparatory commissions for the encyclical Veritatis Splendor.

I ask our readers to join with my fellow members of the Dominican Order in praying for the respose of the soul of this great, learned, and holy friar.

If anyone in Rome is interested in a Mass for his Soul, my email is found linked on this web
page: http://www.st-thomas-aquinas.org/schola.php