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Worse than deja vu all over again: Vatican caves
The Remnant ^ | March 31, 2004 | Thomas Drolesky

Posted on 04/03/2004 9:38:01 AM PST by ultima ratio

Worse Than Deja Vu All Over Again:

Vatican caves on meaningful reform of disastrous New Mass

Thomas A. Droleskey, Ph.D.

“Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colors, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.”

--Pope John Paul, while still Bishop of Krakow, as quoted in Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla. P. 220

When last we left the saga of the Novus Ordo Missae, Pope John Paul II promised Catholics worldwide that a new set of instructions to correct liturgical abuses would be drawn up and issued by the Holy See as a follow up to his Ecclesia de Eucharistica encyclical letter. This caused many well-meaning Catholics in the Novus Ordo community to jump up and down for joy, believing that the long awaited crackdown from Rome was forthcoming. Some commentators said at the time that the Pope’s encyclical letter was just the word “we needed” to have during the Easter season. Others of us said that the Holy Father’s encyclical letter made many of the same points as his 1980 Holy Thursday letter to priests, Dominicae Cenae, which promised a set of instructions to correct liturgical abuses.

Well, if a news report from Catholic World News’s website is to be believed, the forthcoming document from Rome about the liturgy is worse than deja vu all over again. The 1980 instruction, Inaestimabile Donum, issued by the then named Sacred Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship, did list the major abuses in the new Mass and called for them to be corrected. This gave much hope to those of us who did not then have the grace of tradition. Indeed, I waved copies of Inaestimabile Donum in the faces of offending priests for a year or two before I realized that Rome wasn’t going to enforce anything, including the reaffirmation of the ban on girl altar boys. Many of us did not realize at the time that the abuses were simply manifestations of the false presuppositions of a synthetic liturgy that sought to empty the Mass of its authentic tradition while claiming positivistically that tradition had been maintained as it was “updated.” There was no correcting the Novus Ordo then. There is no correcting it now. There will never be any correction of abuses in the Novus Ordo.

According to the CWN.com news story, the new document from Rome dealing with the liturgy will not mandate any disciplinary measures against liturgical abuses. It will merely call for an adherence to existing norms by “proper training” in the liturgy. If true, this is actually worse than Inaestimabile Donum. All of the thunder made by Francis Cardinal Arinze, Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship, in the immediate aftermath of the Pope’s encyclical last year was merely rhetoric, which yielded in the final instance to the desires of the ideological descendants of the late Archbishop Annibale Bugnini to keep exploding the liturgical time bombs that Michael Davies has noted with great precision were placed into the Novus Ordo as it was being created synthetically by the Consilium. Although this was entirely predictable, the fact that the new document will not represent the salvation of the Novus Ordo, which admits of so many legitimate adaptations and exceptions as to make any discussion of a liturgical “rite” an absolute oxymoron, should give traditionally minded priests who remain in the diocesan structure a wake up call. Rin Tin Tin and the Cavalry are not coming from Fort Apache.

All discussion of a “universal indult” for priests to offer the Traditional Latin Mass evidently has disappeared from the final text of the soon to be released liturgical document. Of course, Quo Primum is the only universal and perpetually binding indult any priest has ever needed to offer the Immemorial Mass of Tradition. The powers that be in Rome, however, do not want to admit that on behalf of the Holy Father, who must give his approval to the new document. Thus, those traditionally minded priests who thought that they were going to get a golden parachute from the Holy See so as to be able to offer the Traditional Latin Mass in the daylight rather than in the underground have been deceived. As good sons of the Church, many of these priests wanted to wait and see, although the outcome was predictable. Now that the outcome is clear, it is time for these priests to respond to this wake up call. They will receive no help from this pope.

Indeed, Pope John Paul II is wedded to the liturgical revolution, and has been since the Second Vatican Council. He is not going to be leading the cavalry over the hill. The late Father Vincent Miceli gave me a very important insight into the mind of the Holy Father back in January of 1983. As a self-deceived Catholic conservative who held out high hopes for the pontificate of the former Karol Cardinal Wojtyla when he was elevated to the Throne of Saint Peter on October 16, 1978, I was flabbergasted that the Pope had appointed the then Archbishop of Cincinnati, Joseph Bernardin, to succeed the late John Cardinal Cody as Archbishop of Chicago. Bernardin? Chicago? That was the stuff of Father Andrew Greeley. I had written a priest-friend in Canada in 1979 at around the time Greeley began to push Bernardin for Chicago, that “this will never happen in the pontificate of Pope John Paul II. Father Miceli took a few bites out of his meal at a diner in Massapequa Park, Long Island, New York, looked at me and said, “The Pope’s a liberal. Bernardin is a friend of his from the Second Vatican Council. They are fellow progressives. Don’t kid yourself.” He continued eating his meal in perfect peace. Well, although I filed Father Miceli’s wise counsel away, I didn’t want to believe it at the time. He was, of course, quite right.

To wit, I received a letter from a reader of Christ or Chaos (which is going to become an online publication by the end of February) that contained a nugget from a 1980 book, Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla, written by a fellow named Malinski and published in France:

"In 1965—when Pope John Paul II was still the Bishop of Krakow, he discussed the phenomenon referred to as inculturation with a friend, saying: 'Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colors, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.'" (page 220)

The reader, Mr. A. E. Newman, had a pithy comment or two of his own in his letter to me: “Tell me, what hope is there from a man who thinks like this–what hope for a stable liturgy, for upholding of age long traditions? What hope from a man who flies in the face of his predecessors? Now that his reign is drawing to a close I can answer that [there is] no hope! My own view is that in the eyes of history the last three popes will bear a heavy responsibility for our present shambles and [the loss] among the faithful of millions. Just at the moment when Islam is strong. We can credit him for one thing: he followed through! God will deal with him, but we [will deal] with the deformation of our Faith.”

Although the fodder for an entire series of articles, the comments of the then Archbishop of Krakow are quite instructive. They should serve as a sobering reminder to good priests and laity who believed that the Novus Ordo can be reformed that the problem rests in the new Mass itself. Not much time needs to be wasted on this as the proverbial handwriting is really on the wall. Those traditionally minded priests who have remained in the Novus Ordo structure should stop believing that their words or even their presence can counteract entirely the harm to the Faith contained within the new Mass, admitting that there are priests within the diocesan structure who are zealous for the salvation of souls and who spend themselves tirelessly for the flock entrusted to their pastoral care. They should, as painful as it may be for them to consider, simply follow the courageous examples of Father Stephen P. Zigrang and Father Lawrence Smith. They should assert their rights under Quo Primum no matter what unjust ecclesiastical consequences might befall them. Many of their sheep will follow them, and those sheep will provide for their temporal needs, as is happening at Our Lady Help of Christians Chapel in Garden Grove, California, where hundreds upon hundreds of fed-up Catholics have found their way to the Catholic underground simply by word of mouth. It is simply time to force the Novus Ordo structure, built on quicksand, to collapse of its own intellectual dishonesty and liturgical incompleteness. It is time for good priests to say goodbye to a synthetic concoction and to bravely embrace the glory of Tradition.

Each priest must make his own decision in this regard. It is, though, a grave disservice to the faithful to try to pretend that the Novus Ordo itself is not the problem and/or that the problems will get better over the course of time. They will not. The Novus Ordo remains the prisoner of its own false presuppositions and of the devolution of liturgical decision making to local level, as was envisioned in Paragraph 22 of Sacrosanctum Concilium itself on December 1, 1963.

What applies to priests applies as well to the long-suffering laity who have waited for such a long time to see the abuses that have their origin in the Novus Ordo itself come to an end. So many good people, who dearly love God and want to save their souls, have fought valiant but ever failing efforts in most instances to keep the liturgical time bombs from exploding in their own local parishes and dioceses. Some of these people have tried to equip themselves with the latest “information” from Rome about what is licit and illicit in the context of Holy Mass. What these good people need to realize, though, is that the Novus Ordo is impermanent and unstable of its very nature. The new Mass is entirely predicated upon the idiosyncratic predilections of a bishop or a priest or diocesan and/or parish liturgical committees.

The Mass of Tradition has always been beyond even the realm of a bishop to change for reasons of “inculturation” or the “genius of the peoples.” The Immemorial Mass of Tradition gives God the fitting and solemn worship that is His due, communicates clearly and unequivocally the nature of the Mass as a propitiatory sacrifice for human sins, and provides a permanence and stability that are reflective of the nature of God Himself and of man’s need for Him and His unchanging truths. It is time for good lay people themselves to say goodbye to the angst and confusion and anger generated by all of the problems associated with the Novus Ordo Missae.

Enough said.

Our Lady, Help of Christians, pray for us.


TOPICS: Catholic; Worship
KEYWORDS: johnpaulii; novusordo
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The Holy See is the source of the malady in the Church, not the remedy. The problem is that it is no longer fully Catholic. Its offices are comprised of some men who are Catholic and some who are apostates. The Pope himself is heterodox, unclear, inconsistent--and liberal. He is in opposition to his preconciliar predecessors.

The solution is not to remain in the Novus Ordo Church but to return to the Catholic Church--wherever it exists, in pockets of traditional faith around the world. We must be Catholics in faith first, obedient second! If the Holy See will not lead us in orthodoxy, we should not follow it into heterodoxy.

1 posted on 04/03/2004 9:38:01 AM PST by ultima ratio
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To: ultima ratio
***“Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colors, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.”

--Pope John Paul, while still Bishop of Krakow, as quoted in Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla. P. 220
***

Amazing statement. Does have a Proddy ring to it.
2 posted on 04/03/2004 9:43:25 AM PST by drstevej
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To: All

Donate Here By Secure Server

3 posted on 04/03/2004 9:43:44 AM PST by Support Free Republic (Freepers post from sun to sun, but a fundraiser bot's work is never done.)
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To: Akron Al; Alberta's Child; Andrew65; AniGrrl; Antoninus; apologia_pro_vita_sua; attagirl; ...
Ping
4 posted on 04/03/2004 9:58:59 AM PST by Land of the Irish
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To: ultima ratio
While John Paul II might not be a traditionalist or conservative enough, he is not a liberal, especially a liberal like the late Bernadin.
5 posted on 04/03/2004 10:30:31 AM PST by StAthanasiustheGreat (Vocatus Atque Non Vocatus Deus Aderit)
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To: ultima ratio
Wonderful post! Thank you!
6 posted on 04/03/2004 11:56:49 AM PST by Canticle_of_Deborah
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To: ultima ratio
As usual you display your schismatic views for all to see, using the term "Novus Ordo Church" to refer to the Catholic Church, and actively promoting schism (this is far beyond quietly going to a Tridentine mass) by encouraging others in disobedience to an orthodox Pope, and saying that the Holy See is leading people to heterodoxy. You ought to be ashamed of your lies and the hatred you incite against the Holy Father, who is perfectly orthodox.
7 posted on 04/03/2004 11:59:53 AM PST by Unam Sanctam
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To: NWU Army ROTC
While John Paul II might not be a traditionalist or conservative enough, he is not a liberal, especially a liberal like the late Bernadin.

He's a liturgical liberal and a doctrinal liberal but not a social liberal.

8 posted on 04/03/2004 4:44:11 PM PST by Grey Ghost II
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To: Unam Sanctam; ultima ratio
As usual you display your schismatic views for all to see, using the term "Novus Ordo Church"

He could have just said "Lutheran Church". It's all the same these days.

9 posted on 04/03/2004 4:46:06 PM PST by Grey Ghost II
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To: ultima ratio
According to the CWN.com news story, the new document from Rome dealing with the liturgy will not mandate any disciplinary measures against liturgical abuses. It will merely call for an adherence to existing norms by “proper training” in the liturgy. If true, this is actually worse than Inaestimabile Donum.

Dorlesky bump

10 posted on 04/03/2004 5:10:24 PM PST by Dajjal
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To: Grey Ghost II
He could have just said "Lutheran Church". It's all the same these days.

2. So the fathers of the fourth Council of Constantinople, following the footsteps of their predecessors, published this solemn profession of faith: The first condition of salvation is to maintain the rule of the true faith. And since that saying of our lord Jesus Christ, You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church [55], cannot fail of its effect, the words spoken are confirmed by their consequences. For in the Apostolic See the Catholic religion has always been preserved unblemished, and sacred doctrine been held in honor. Since it is our earnest desire to be in no way separated from this faith and doctrine, we hope that we may deserve to remain in that one communion which the Apostolic See preaches, for in it is the whole and true strength of the Christian religion [56].

11 posted on 04/03/2004 5:27:23 PM PST by gbcdoj
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To: Unam Sanctam; NWU Army ROTC; Land of the Irish; broadsword; Canticle_of_Deborah; ultima ratio; ...
“Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colors, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.”

--Pope John Paul, while still Bishop of Krakow, as quoted in Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla. P. 220

VERSUS

JUAN CARDINAL DE TORQUEMADA [IOANNES DE TURRECREMATA], O.P. (1388-1468)
OFFICIALLY DESIGNATED THEOLOGIAN OF THE COUNCIL OF BASEL/FLORENCE GIVEN BY POPE EUGENIUS IV THE TITLE OF "DEFENDER OF THE FAITH"

"By disobedience, the Pope can separate himself from Christ despite the fact that he is head of the Church, for above all, the unity of the Church is dependent upon its relationship with Christ. The Pope can separate himself from Christ either by disobeying the law of Christ, or by commanding something that is against the divine or natural law. by doing so, the Pope separates himself from the body of the Church because this body is itself linked to Christ by obedience. In this way, the Pope would, without doubt, fall into schism.... "He would do that if he did not observe that which the Universal Church observes in basing herself on the Tradition of the Apostles, or if he did not observe that which has been ordained for the whole world by the universal councils or by the authority of the Apostolic See. Especially is this true with regard to the divine liturgy, as, for example, if he did not wish personally to follow the universal customs and rites of the Church. This same holds true for other aspects of the liturgy in a very general fashion, as would be the case of one unwilling to celebrate with priestly vestments, or in consecrated places, or with candles, or if he refused to make the sign of the cross as other priests do, or other similar things which, in a general way, relate to perpetual usage in conformity with the Canons. "By thus separating himself apart, and with obstinacy, from the observance of the universal customs and rites of the Church, the Pope could fall into schism. The conclusion is sound and the premises are not in doubt, since just as the Pope can fall into heresy, so also he can disobey and transgress with obstinacy that which has been established for the common order of the Church. Thus it is that [Pope] Innocent [III] states (De Consuetudine) that it is necessary to obey a Pope in all things as long as he does not himself go against the universal customs of the Church, but should he go against the universal customs of the church, he ought not to be obeyed...."
(Summa de Ecclesia [1489])

12 posted on 04/03/2004 5:43:27 PM PST by Viva Christo Rey
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To: gbcdoj; Unam Sanctam; NWU Army ROTC; Land of the Irish; broadsword; Canticle_of_Deborah; ...
NINETEENTH (DOGMATIC) ECUMENICAL COUNCIL, TRENT (1545-1563)

"Si quis dixerit, receptos et approbatos ecclesiae catholicae ritus in solemni sacramentorum administratione adhiberi consuetos aut contemni, aut sine peccato a ministris pro libito omitti, aut in novus alio per quemcumque ecclesiarum pastorem mutari posse: anathema sit." - -Session VII, Canon 13

"If anyone says that the received and approved rites of the Catholic Church, accustomed to be used in the administration of the Sacraments, may be despised or omitted by the ministers without sin and at their pleasure, or may be changed by any pastor (a term that includes the Supreme Pastor, the Pope] of the churches to other new ones, let him be anathema."

13 posted on 04/03/2004 5:52:31 PM PST by Viva Christo Rey
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To: Viva Christo Rey; gbcdoj; Unam Sanctam; NWU Army ROTC; Land of the Irish; broadsword; ...
“Certainly, we will preserve the basic elements, the bread, the wine, but all else will be changed according to local traditions: words, gestures, colors, vestments, chants, architecture, decor. The problem of liturgical reform is immense.”

--"Pope" John Paul, while still Bishop of Krakow, as quoted in Mon Ami: Karol Wojtyla. P. 220

VERSUS

FRANCISCO SUAREZ, S.J. (1548-1617)
CALLED BY POPE PAUL V DOCTOR EXIMIUS ET PIUS (MOST EXALTED AND PIOUS)

"Et hoc secundo modo posset Papa esse schismaticus, si nollet tenere cum toto Ecclesiae corpore unionem et coniunctionem quam debet, ut si tentat et totem Ecclesiam excommunicare, aut si vellet omnes Ecclesiasticas caeremonias apostolica traditione firmatas evertere. (De Charitate, Disputatio XII de Schismate, sectio 1) >p> "And in this second way the Pope could be schismatic, if he were unwilling to be in normal union with the whole body of the Church, as would occur if he attempted to excommunicate the whole Church, or, as both Cajetan and Torquemada observe, if he wished to overturn the rites of the Church based on Apostolic Tradition."

14 posted on 04/03/2004 5:57:32 PM PST by Viva Christo Rey
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To: Viva Christo Rey
58. It follows from this that the Sovereign Pontiff alone enjoys the right to recognize and establish any practice touching the worship of God, to introduce and approve new rites, as also to modify those he judges to require modification.[50] (Pius XII, Mediator Dei)
It furthermore declares, that this power has ever been in the Church, that, in the dispensation of the sacraments, their substance being untouched, it may ordain,--or change, what things soever it may judge most expedient, for the profit of those who receive, or for the veneration of the said sacraments, according to the difference of circumstances, times, and places. (Council of Trent, Sess. XXII Ch. II)

15 posted on 04/03/2004 6:17:41 PM PST by gbcdoj
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To: Unam Sanctam
"As usual you display your schismatic views for all to see, using the term "Novus Ordo Church" to refer to the Catholic Church, and actively promoting schism (this is far beyond quietly going to a Tridentine mass) by encouraging others in disobedience to an orthodox Pope, and saying that the Holy See is leading people to heterodoxy."


1. Is this not a self-proclaimed New Order? Has it anything much to do with the ancient Catholic Church? I don't think so. It has invented a new Mass. It invents new sacramental prayers. It invents new doctrines. It is negligent of the deposit of faith and is slipshod about catechesis. The New Order trashes Tradition, whereas the historical Catholic Church fiercely protected it. I am not imagining any of this. Two thirds of all Catholics--especially among the young--no longer believe in the Real Presence. This is a catastrophic statistic, yet the Novus Ordo Church is not much bothered by it. It does nothing to discourage this erosion, but continues to institute practices which further undermine this distinctly Catholic dogma. This is truly a radical way of leading the faithful--by showing an unprecedented carelessness about the truths of faith. It is revolutionary and blameworthy and unacceptable. It is not truly Catholic.

2. Remember, it was St. Paul who warned us to stick with tradition. We were not even to follow an angel come down from heaven if he seduced the faithful with a new Gospel. Only the ancient faith transmits the fullness of apostolic truth. So the real problem remains with this strangely eccentric pontiff. We must indeed give him every benefit of a doubt and recognize his authority in most situations. But when he veers far from a traditional path, we should never follow him. If he were altogether orthodox as you insist, there would be no problem. But he manifestly isn't. If he prays with animists, should we do likewise--out of charity--and thereby deny the truthfulness of faith in Christ? I don't think so--not if we take the sin of indifferentism seriously. So it goes with much of what he does and says. We should reject such heterodoxy and follow tradition!

3. The Holy See--which is another term for the Vatican apparatus--is no longer fully Catholic. That is a fact, not something I make up. This bureaucracy--which had once been identified with the Catholic Church per se--no longer is fully Catholic. That is to say, it is now comprised in part of men who no longer have the true Catholic faith. Some are disguised Lutherans. Some are humanists with no religion at all. Some are true Catholics. The problem for the faithful is that it is no longer possible to trust such a failed institution. Tradition alone can preserve the faith in the present situation.
16 posted on 04/03/2004 6:24:59 PM PST by ultima ratio
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To: gbcdoj
POPE PIUS XII:

"The sacred pastors are not the inventors and composers of the Gospel, but merely the authorized guardians and preachers divinely established. Wherefore, we ourselves, and all bishops with us, can and must repat the words of Jesus Christ: "My teaching is not my own, but his who sent me" (John 7:16)....

"Therefore, we are not teachers of a doctrine born of the human mind, but we are in conscience bound to embrace and follow the doctrine which Christ Our Lord taught and which He solemnly commanded His Apostles and their successors to teach (Matthew 28:19-20)." (Encyclical Letter "Ad Sinarum Gentem," October 7, 1954)

17 posted on 04/03/2004 7:04:48 PM PST by Viva Christo Rey
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To: ultima ratio
I don't understand your reasoning. I assume by Novus Ordo Church you are referring to some Tridentine-type Mass. I've got news for you. Jesus never spoke Latin! Peter never spoke Latin. The Apostles never spoke Latin! If anything, by taking your arguments that the Church is moving away from doctrine, it did the same thing when the Tridentine Mass was adopted. The first Mass where Jesus gave us His Body and Blood was not spoken in Latin, but Aramaic. It was what became the Latin Church that one could say moved away from tradition to begin with. So if we are to remain to tradition, then we should all speak Aramiac at Mass.

You also promote schism, which Jesus clearly spoke against by praying to the Father that we all remain one! Yes, the Eucharistic real presence is not believed in by many Catholics this day - and it is truly sad. But let me tell you there is a tide turning with more and more youth turning back to the Church and doctrine. This is not due to a bunch of people yearning for Latin, but for those heeding the call of the Pope to "be not afraid" and encounter Christ.

On the fact that some Church officials as you claim are apostates, I would have to agree. BUT look at the Bible. Judas Iscariot was one of Jesus' trusted. He saw his miracles with his own eyes and yet he turned away by stealing and ultimately betraying our Savior to death. So, yes, there are probably those who you would call apostates in the Catholic Church just like Judas. BUT I would be willing to bet there are just the same proportion in the Baptist, Lutheran, Orthodox, or your Novus Ordo Church as well.

I do disagree with your challenge of the Pope's authority. You are promoting schism and disobedience which is in contradiction of the first Vatican Council which formally outlined Papal Infallibility. One must have faith that the Holy Spirit is leading the Church as Jesus said he will never abandon his Church. There are those, however, who abandon Jesus and his Church, which is why we sadly have over 28,000 denominations of whom many stress the salvation of their Church members and the damnation of the others.

Bottom line. Don't let people appeal to your emotions, it is the first sign of an illogical statement. If all we do is nitpick the rules and see who is following what then we lose sight of the true dimension JESUS in the Eucharist and we become Pharisees of a sort, the very people who killed Jesus, except we will do it by sowing disunity and disobedience to God and the Church Jesus founded.
18 posted on 04/03/2004 9:35:32 PM PST by awick
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To: ultima ratio
We must be Catholics in faith first, obedient second! If the Holy See will not lead us in orthodoxy, we should not follow it into heterodoxy.

How can you be a Catholic without a Pope? Isn't that one of the basic definitions of a Catholic: one who is in communion with the Bishop of Rome?

19 posted on 04/03/2004 10:23:55 PM PST by ksen (This day we fight! By all that you hold dear on this good earth I bid you stand, Men of the West!)
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To: awick
You don't understand what I say because you don't understand the ancient Mass and what it means. You think it's all about the Latin language. But the language is really a side issue. I am just as harsh in criticizing the Novus Ordo in Latin as I am in criticizing it in English.

The ancient Mass--that which is normally called the Tridentine Mass--is essentially different from the Novus Ordo. It theologically expresses the Catholic faith, not the Protestant faith (as does the Novus Ordo!), because it emphasizes Christ's atonement for our sins through His sacrifice at Calvary. In this sense the old Mass is essentially sacrificial, from start to finish.

The Novus Ordo has deemphasized propitiatory sacrifice, speaking only of a "sacrifice of praise" for our redemption, in the Lutheran manner, celebrating this through the paschal meal--which is really an imitation of the Protestant Lord's Supper. So it is radically different from the old Catholic Mass and has strong Protestant theological congregationalist underpinnings. It deliberately hides the mystery of the Real Presence, for instance, emphasizing throughout the virtual presence of Christ in Scripture and in the Community. This is why nobody kneels anymore to receive Communion; it is why Communion in the hands is favored; it is why the Blessed Sacrament in the tabernacle has been shunted aside, taken out of the sanctuary's central place of honor. Other reasons will be given by bishops for these changes--but the real reason is to undermine the dogma of the Real Presence.

So do some reading and learn something about these liturgical differences. Attend the old Mass and learn how different its sense of the sacred is from what is being pawned off in the Novus Ordo liturgy today--a concoction invented by a committee of humanists only a mere thirty-five years ago. The ancient Mass worships God; the Novus Ordo celebrates ourselves--which is why the priest now faces the people and not east, symbolic of facing God the Father. These are radically different liturgies in orientation and this difference has nothing to do with mere language.

It's true Jesus probably offered the Last Supper in Aramaic as you say. But we have no way of knowing how this was done exactly. We do have an idea of what the apostles wanted, however, because there is every indication the canon of the ancient Roman Rite goes back to St. Peter himself and was probably first celebrated by early Roman Christians in Latin, not in Greek, as had been originally supposed. It has evolved slowly over the centuries under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, until its canon was finally fixed by the fifth century. So it has been around for a very long time and Pius V even decreed it should remain the Mass of the Church forever. This was a stricture violated by Paul VI--with disastrous consequences.

As for your other charge--I do not promote schism as you say. I strongly deny that I urge disobedience to the Pope. I urge criticism where it is justified, rather than the mere hero worship of celebrity. And I urge Catholics who should know better to be more aware of the shenanigans of important men at the top. There is a very big difference between this and urging schism. I urge this because the evidence is everywhere that we are slowly losing the faith. Catholics should therefore stick closely to the traditions which have come down through the ages and to the faith embodied by these traditions. I would urge young Catholics especially to look warily on those who put forward novelties never before taught, and to take a closer look at old-fashioned notions such as sin and hell and penance. They are not much discussed anymore. I say this because there is a dangerous liberal faction within the Vatican that wishes to impose on the rest of us a new faith that ignores these realities. This must be rejected.

As for sowing disunity--who does this, people like myself, who follow tradition, or those who urge on us doctrines and practices which are radically new and in opposition to the faith Catholics have practiced for the previous two millenia? I would say the latter. The New Mass is a recent concoction--going back only thirty+ years. It is a casual, careless, faith-destroying liturgy which has had disastrous consequences. It was not the doing of traditionalists--it was the doing of the revolutionary New Order.
20 posted on 04/03/2004 11:03:05 PM PST by ultima ratio
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