World’s Foremost Liturginazi Dies

The world’s foremost liturginazi died peacefully this past week at his home in Kansas City.

Originally from Cody, Wyoming, Gerard Schmitz moved to Kansas City to pursue his passion for liturgical criticism. Schmitz was the founding member of the Phineas Society for Liturgical Purity, an international organization that tracks and ranks liturgical corrections, and was credited with 39,587 liturgical corrections over his lifetime, an astounding average of more than one correction per day.

“Some people just don’t love the liturgy enough to understand,” said Johnathan Lewis, who knew Schmitz and admired his passion for rubrical correctness. “One mispronounced word or slightly wrong gesture and the whole Mass is illicit. How people can take this so lightly is beyond me. What’s truly remarkable is that he went the hard route. Anyone can rack up the corrections at a Novus Ordo. There’re usually four or five rubrical violations before the first reading. Arnold was different—he was not interested in what was easy. He attended the Extraordinary Form exclusively, and that’s the big leagues.”

“Pops moved to Kansas City because there they have the Institute of Christ the King, the Fraternity of St. Peter, and both the Society of St. Pius X and another Fraternity parish right down the road,” said his daughter Perpetua Felicity Hufford. “He would make the rounds on the weekend and attend all of them in his battle to root out liturgical abuse.”

“When you saw Arnold in the front pew, you knew that you were in for it,” said local priest Anthony Robinson. “He would beat me to the sacristy, quoting particular rubrical numbers as well as chapter and verse from obscure ceremonials. When he began to measure the depth of head bows and nods with construction surveying equipment, I was concerned. And once he got that drone, then it really got out of hand.”

At press time, local priests are breathing a sigh of relief at Schmitz’s passing.