Clear Creek Area
Clear Creekers! I’m a lifelong practicing, believing Catholic born and raised in Broken Arrow outside of Tulsa, educated in Catholic schools, attending the TLM now for over 25 years. I’ve visited the monastery around 40-50 times since 2000, and was designated as a “Friend of the Monastery” by the monks beginning about 2005.
I imagine there are some of you who have braved the move to the Clear Creek monastery area who do not attend the Novus Ordo at Holy Cross in Wagoner the Sundays it is said in a moral traditional way than the TLM. The TLM decidedly not being made available there on a weekly basis. And the monastery not being meant as a public Association for laity on Sundays.
Likewise, I imagine there may be many people concerned about the current direction in the Church still under Pope Leo begun by Pope Francis, of phasing out the TLM, replacing it gradually with the Novus Ordo for us, perhaps at times dressed up in lace and Latin. Like many, we see Traditionis Custodes to be bringing an eventual complete end to the Mass of the Ages, and all of its patrimony, at least on a practical level. Even to be expected for the FSSP, Institute, or Clear Creek monks.
This same Invitation also applies to Catholics attending Most Precious Blood (FSSP) in Tulsa, who may be seeing stormy waters ahead for all the formerly Ecclesia Dei groups, or even a typhoon that brings them to an end.
The Whole Diocese
Also,, all Catholics throughout Tulsa and eastern Oklahoma are hereby Invited. I’m thinking of many in rural areas with no nearby Mass who can join us online to better keep Sundays holy. Or those minority unabashed pro-TLM, pro-Tradition Catholics “riding the back pew” of the Novus Ordo as I describe them, who bring their Sunday missals dressed in their Sunday best, with the women dressed in skirts or dresses and wearing the chapel veil or mantillas. The kind who frequent EWTN, Crisis magazine, or the Latin Mass Journal. People who if they had access would attend the TLM in a heartbeat.
Wherever you attend Mass in this Diocese, or when, you invited to check out Info HERE and contact us for an invite to our private Association, to our Sunday afternoon Holy Hour and fellowship. To meet in person or connect online. To find out the meeting time, place, calendar schedule, plans for fellowship, online availability, etc.
Attending Online
I am floating different ideas. We are in Broken Arrow where Franciscan Villa nursing home, once under the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother, still has a chapel with a tabernacle and the Blessed Sacrament reserved. They would likely allow us to pray in their chapel, and also visit Catholic residents there inviting them to join our Association, to bring them fully back to Catholic Tradition, like the ones raised with the TLM.
We do not want the TLM nor wider traditional Remnant in our local Church to be ended one day. Nor to allow the modernists and liberals to bring about this end. In anticipation of that very real possibility, we are organizing now.
Before it finally happens so there won’t be as much shock or disorientation what to do. But an extraordinary, pre-existing place and group with which to go seek refuge and peace of mind. Especially in light of recent developments in the Church this summer adverse to the Traditional Movement.
A Confederacy of Traditional Chapels
Hopefully one day that may mean 1) a private Traditional Chapel in the greater Tulsa area, 2) one in the area near Clear Creek monastery, and 3) others in rural areas. As in down the line beginning now, in the next years or decades. Until one day this Crisis comes to an end.
And with physical structures called Chapels built on private property, as allowed by canon law. A remnant of Catholics faithful to Tradition and seeking the total elimination of the Crisis of modernism and liberalism within the Mystical Body of Christ. First by removing ourselves as much as we can from those Errors.
We start with the basic private Association organizing and meeting on a schedule, especially people joining in Online.
Then more formal House Chapels, more people meeting in person.
Then over time build private Chapels on private property.
Then at times in a way that is in accord with canon law, host a priest and the TLM.
All officially operating within the sphere of ordinary jurisdiction, as a canonical Association.
It could be a network that one TLM-offering priest could hypothetically serve in one Sunday. Say 9 am in the Tulsa area, 1 pm out by Clear Creek, and then 6 pm say down by Durant for example. Whatever are the circumstances. When such a priest is available.
In the spirit of the Catholic followers of the Father of Orthodoxy, St. Athanasius, who established House Chapels when most bishops were Arian, Semi-Arian, or leaned Arian. Or in the spirit of those Japanese Catholics who for 200 years without priests maintained the Faith in private House Chapels.
A Confederacy of Traditional Catholic Private Associations and Private Chapels on private property across the Diocese of Tulsa, all fully established according to canon law, in full accord with and submission to our local Ordinary.
Imagine that.
This is one viable response in all dioceses, especially those without the TLM now or in the future.
To be relied on now as a supplement to the current situation, or for some the only viable option (ex: for the homebound, those without the Mass, those without a non-gravely compromised Mass, the sick, those in nursing homes, etc.). In the future, ready to be both a supplement or an alternative if/when the TLM is fully suppressed. And modernism gets worse.
All it takes is a little house altar prayer area and a social media feed. Invite friends, family, people you meet shopping or at the doctor’s office, anywhere. End with a potluck or coffee and dessert. Or go out to eat. Or just chat a while.
Be ready to give people a pamphlet or business card with info. Reach out beyond the diocese or even the US to anyone who in their local situation needs to be a part of such an Oasis of true peace, faith, hope, and charity. To help build it up!
Some might ask “Why not just set up your association as a Public Association or public Chapel? Directly under the SSPX?” Or under an Independent Traditional Priest?
Answer: per our founding theological positions, we state that as a formal private Association we do have informal friendship towards SSPX priests and like-minded priests. As well as all pro-TLM priests. We likewise maintain as a legitimate private and public position that the current Crisis in the Church stems from serious problems with Vatican II, the liturgical reform, certain orientations by the papacy, Vatican, and bishops, all problems of which intimately relate to doctrine and maintaining the true Faith. We maintain it is legitimate to theologically consider different theological analyses in understanding these serious problems.
However, the vast majority of traditional Catholics in this diocese have historically not formally affiliated with the SSPX, or with at the time the independent priest from Oklahoma City Fr. Graham Walters, for, in part, historical and geographic reasons. Whether or not we want to do so, or should, or would be justified in doing so, we predict this endeavor would therefore not work at this time in that kind of format or structure for practical reasons.
Also, the normal means to seek the TLM and Catholic Tradition as a whole naturally is through the bishop. We can do so while maintaining our legitimate, canonical positions, and the orientation to the Crisis that follows.
As carefully written.
This is not the official position of our Association, as it currently exists, but it is my personal belief that because the Church is in a state of necessity and emergency, that supplied jurisdiction does exist. I’m sure the SSPX would be willing to serve the Tulsa Diocese again if the circumstances ever change. Time will tell as the situation in the Church and diocese unfolds.
** Disclaimer: other than the official positions of our Association and this Invitation, any views or positions expressed in this or other blog posts by me do not formally represent that of the canonical Association **
Will have more to say as time unfolds. I hear in a week or so temperatures fall here to Fall-like levels! Something to look forward to around the next bend.
You are not alone. Come join our little traditional Oasis to help keep the Faith of our Fathers!
God is merciful

























