or these diocese could do a better job at vetting their so-called heraldic experts

steven harris;95724 wrote:

or these diocese could do a better job at vetting their so-called heraldic experts

And who in the scores of dioceses would be qualified to do this?

Joseph McMillan;95728 wrote:

And who in the scores of dioceses would be qualified to do this?

My vote goes towards Fr. Guy and Fr. Dohrman.

Snyder wrote:

Quote:

My vote goes towards Fr. Guy and Fr. Dohrman.

Mine, too, but one of the things I’ve learned from being married into a Catholic family is that every bishop is a prince within his own diocese—i.e., there’s only one vote that counts—and we wouldn’t be having this conversation if most of them took heraldry seriously enough to bring on an outsider as a quality-control enforcer.

In fairness, I think it should be pointed out that the personal heraldry of Catholic prelates in the United States far exceeds in quantity and quality the personal heraldry of other ecclesiastical leaders or, for that matter, any comparable slice of the U.S. population. And Catholic diocesan heraldry is, by and large, quite good, especially (but not only) for the older sees.

Joseph McMillan;95736 wrote:

and we wouldn’t be having this conversation if most of them took heraldry seriously enough to bring on an outsider as a quality-control enforcer.

But isn’t that exactly what they do?  Father Timothy Pelc is in the Archdiocese of Detroit, and Deacon Paul Sullivan (whose work we’ve also seen here) is in the Diocese of Providence.  These dioceses already uses “outside” experts – I’d just rather that they use more expert experts.

I’ve found—-and Frs. Guy and Dohrman can better speak to this—-that diocese pick their heraldic artist on one of two qualities: (1) the bishop (or someone in the curia) knows about or has worked with John Doe before; or (2) the diocese has turned to John Doe for the last X number of bishops. There really is no vetting process, probably because no one really thinks that heraldry is a discipline. As was pointed out before, in the US most people don’t ever see heraldry. So, I honestly see this less as bishops being autocratic and more as they’re completely lost and have not one to turn to. In that situation, I wouldn’t blame them for turning toward someone a friend recommends or someone who has produced dozens of episcopal arms before, regardless of whether these people possess any heraldic skill.

Dcgb7f;95740 wrote:

So, I honestly see this less as bishops being autocratic and more as they’re completely lost and have not one to turn to.

If only there was some sort of "Society" out there that had dedicated itself to studying "American Heraldry"; it would be even better if it had a couple of priests among its number.

Like, say, the AHS???

Well, Bishop Monforton is from Detroit. Fr. Pelc is from (wait for it)...Detroit. So, this bishop turned to someone who was from his own native diocese and has done coats of arms for several of their auxiliary bishops. If a priest of my diocese became a bishop it wouldn’t be odd for him to ask me to do his coat of arms even though there are better heraldic artists out there than me.

Frequently, i will actually contact a new bishop to offer to do his coat of arms but I usually do that with bishops with whom I have some connection either directly or indirectly. At the moment, despite my best efforts, the USCCB does not wish to get involved with having a committee to act as heraldic consultors. I’ve tried. They ain’t buying it.

Quite by accident, I recently ran across a Canadian grant (on the CHA website) to a Roman catholic bishop in which the crozier, rightly or not, was essentially the same as above, topped with the red Jerusalem cross (assuming I’m in the right thread—an occasional problem lately…).  I’ll try to remember to post the name tomorrow.

Michael F. McCartney;95754 wrote:

Quite by accident, I recently ran across a Canadian grant (on the CHA website) to a Roman catholic bishop in which the crozier, rightly or not, was essentially the same as above, topped with the red Jerusalem cross

You’re in the right thread this time, Michael, but the terminology just needs a little tweaking. A crozier is not another word for cross. Rather, a crozier is the staff carried by some prelates that has a shepherd’s crook at the top. The cross which appears in the arms of a bishop is called simply the cross, or, more correctly, the episcopal cross (and sometimes, incorrectly, the processional cross, which it decidedly is not). In the arms of an archbishop the cross has two horizontal bars and is called (correctly) a patriarchal cross or (incorrectly) a metropolitical cross which is misleading because even archbishops who are not simultaneously metropolitans use such a cross. Occasionally these double-barred crosses are also called archiepiscopal crosses.

But the crozier refers to a different type of staff than the staff that is topped with a cross, of any kind.

The actual name for a staff carried by any bishop is the baculus pastoralis or "pastoral staff" (i.e. shepherd’s staff). For centuries it has been topped by a crook. The one exception is the staff of the pope which terminates in a cross. This is because the staff is a symbol of jurisdiction. The crook in the crozier of a bishop is indicative of the fact that his jurisdiction is limited to a set territory whereas the pope has universal jurisdiction. However, the pope’s baculus pastoralis (which some people insist on calling a "ferula" because they like it when everything has a special Churchy-sounding name even though ferula simply refers to any staff) is not used as a heraldic symbol and it is not the same as an episcopal cross.

gselvester;95744 wrote:

At the moment, despite my best efforts, the USCCB does not wish to get involved with having a committee to act as heraldic consultors. I’ve tried. They ain’t buying it.

Maybe you should kick it up a notch.

Rome already has several academic learned societies in the Curia that were either established by or under the direction of the Holy See.

Why not the “Pontifical Academy of Heraldic Art and Sciences”?  :D

Fr Guy—It’s nice to be in the right place for a change!

The CHA entry is for Donald Bolen, in 2010.  He is identified as the Bishop of Saskatoon, appointed by Pope Benedict.

The CHA blazon doesn’t describe the crozier/cross/thingee, but it’s included in the emblazonment in the same way as the one in Bishop Monforton’s arms at the head of this thread - i.e. a staff with the Jerusalem cross on top—which was criticized here as being incorrect.

Of course the CHA doesn’t speak for the church, so if it was wrong before it’s still wrong now; but the strength of the rule—or at least the effectiveness of the argument in favor of the rule—is obviously weakened when an official heraldic body doesn’t follow it.

Of course as a lapsed Presbyterian semi-Methodist I don’t have a dog in the fight, but FWIW there seems to be at least two logical "common-sense" arguments against this form of cross-on-a-stick: it infringes on the long-standing insignia of a recognized organization within the Roman church, especially if in red; and since it doesn’t follow the usually accepted pattern for bishops, it fails to clearly identify his office.

Now if there were a special bishop or whatever appointed to oversee or serve the Order of the Holy Sepulchre (sp?), it might (to this outsider) make sense for that one bishop; but this doesn’t appear to be the case, or if so, the connection is not addressed.

Steve wrote, ‘Rome already has several academic learned societies in the Curia that were either established by or under the direction of the Holy See.  Why not the “Pontifical Academy of Heraldic Art and Sciences”?’

You might have more luck looking for, or espousing the establishment of, an academy for religious art and symbolism which could then logically serve much the same purpose but on a broader, and likely less controversial, range of topics.  I suspect that the religious would be more open to criteria presented as promoting more meaningful religious symbolism than as promoting heraldic correctness.

Michael F. McCartney;95760 wrote:

Now if there were a special bishop or whatever appointed to oversee or serve the Order of the Holy Sepulchre (sp?), it might (to this outsider) make sense for that one bishop; but this doesn’t appear to be the case, or if so, the connection is not addressed.

Actually, the Grand Master of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre is a bishop, and a Cardinal appointed by the Pope to run the Order. Even he does not use the Jerusalem cross in this way. Rather he quarters his arms with the arms of the Order (Argent, a Jerusalem cross Gules).

If a cleric wishes to show his membership in the EOHS he may display the badge of the order from a ribbon below the shield, place the shield on a cross of the order or, depending on his rank in the order, quarter his arms with the arms of the order. It is also acceptable, according to Heim, simply to display the cross of the order near the shield. But, trying to "kill two birds with one stone" by making the episcopal cross the cross of this, or any, order is really just poor heraldic design.