Posted on 05/02/2005 12:03:36 PM PDT by murphE
You're correct. I don't believe the Holy Spirit floats around a council and tells each bishop what to say and I don't believe He puts on his bi-focals, reads the minutes from the last meeting and establishes the agenda.
The Holy Spirit provides a negative charism. The only thing guaranteed is the freedom from error when it comes to magisterial statements. The success of a Council or the prudence of it's pastoral pronouncements or the wisdom of convening a Council is not guaranteed to be the work of the Holy Spirit. It can be done in spite of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
I forget which Cardinal (might have been Ruffini) told John XXIII to invoke a Council when there is no reason and to not make magisterial pronouncements is to tempt the Spirit.
And Cardinal Siri at the close of the Council said, "If the Church were not Divine this Council would destroy Her."
Here's one of your problems. The Magisterium is the "teaching authority" in the Church. Not the teaching authorities themselves as men. The Curia does not equal the Magisterium. The Curia invokes the Magisterium. The Magisterium is perennial. The Curia is temporal and changing. Every statement out of the mouth or pen of the Pope is not the voice of the Magisterium. But when the Magisterium speaks, it speaks through the voice or pen of the Pope and those in communion with him. But only when he himself is in communion with the Magisterium of the Church.
“I am convinced that the ecclesial crisis in which we find ourselves today depends in great part on the collapse of the liturgy.”
(Agreed. Still doesn't condemn the intent of the novus ordo but liberties taken by un-holy priests in its implementation. Otherwise you are saying that the Pope is declaring Vatican II un-governed by the Holy Spirit, which he is not).
“A community is calling its very being into question when it suddenly declares that what until now was its holiest and highest possession is strictly forbidden and when it makes the longing for it seem downright indecent.”
Vatican II did not condemn the Latin Rite, but gave opportunity to celebrate the faith in the local venacular. The subsequent disappearance of the Latin rite was a matter of personal choice by local clergy, not decree. Those who value the Latin mass have been denied access to it by local clergy, not Vatican II.
“the opening to the world has become a veritable invasion of the Church by worldly thinking. We have perhaps been too weak and imprudent.”
Again, the weakness and imprudence is not on the part of Vatican II, but on the shepherds who have been given the responsibility of guarding the flock. Did Vatican II create an opportunity for worldly thinking to enter? Yes. Was that the intent? No. The invasion of worldly thinking came while the shepherds were sleeping, not the Holy Spirit.
I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to little Lucy of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide that would be represented by the alteration of the faith, in her liturgy, her theology and her soul…. I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past.Agreed, but again, not because of Vatican II, but by opportunists who took liberties which were not theirs to have.
The novus ordo is not improper. Priests who deviate from the language of the Mass and embellish are at fault, not the novus ordo itself.
But only when he himself is in communion with the Magisterium of the Church.
you're implying that at times, Peter does not loose what is loosed in heaven, nor bind what is bound in heaven on matters of faith. Because, if you're saying it's even POSSIBLE that Peter can be out out of communinon with the Magisterium, then that throws doubt on the entire Catholic faith from Day One - and if that's the case, then the Church is a fraud, and Jesus was a liar.
I guess St. Paul was guilty of "clearly displaying a lack of faith in the power of He Who guides the Magisterium."
And when approved translations of the Novus Ordo are so banal then what?
Um you're partly right here...The Council did not condemn the TLM, but it did not [give] opportunity celebrate the faith in the local vernacular.
Paragraph 54 is a key paragraph: “In Masses which are celebrated with the people, a suitable place may be allotted to their mother tongue.” What did the Council have in mind? Let’s continue: “This is to apply in the first place, to the readings and to the Common Prayer. But also as local conditions may warrant, to those parts which pertain to the people.” Yet it goes on to say, “Nevertheless steps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass” — (that is, the unchanging parts, the parts that are there every day) — “which pertain to them.” So, the Council did not abolish Latin in the liturgy. The Council permitted the vernacular in certain limited ways, but clearly understood that the fixed parts of the Mass would remain in Latin. Again, I am just telling you what the Council said.
SOURCE Fr. Fessio- The Mass of Vatican II
Vatican II did not call for a totally new rite of mass, which you realize the NO is don't you? It is not just the TLM in the vernacular...see a comparison here:
New Mass; Inalienable Rite or Inferior Rite?
I agree with Pope Benedict XVI's assessment of the NO, which he made while he was still Cardinal Ratzinger, that it is a: “fabricated liturgy… a banal, on-the-spot product.”
Example: People who do not know the faith think it was pretty stupid of Jesus to pick Judas as a disciple when one looks at the outcome of that choice. Is Jesus worthy of our scorn and condemnation because He chose "poorly" by our human way of thinking? Couldn't we then say that since Jesus chose a betrayer, He was not infallible? Or was Jesus acting in concert with the Holy Spirit and God the Father, in spite of the abuse that Judas would commit against the ministry of Christ and its intended ends?
The fruit of the twelve Apostles, by the standards you're applying in the debate about Vatican II, was betrayal (Judas and Peter) and infidelity (at the Cross) in Jesus' darkest hour. History would have considered the validity of Christianity closed on Good Friday by the standards being thrust upon Vatican II. The reality is, that in spite of the lack of good fruit produced by the Apostles (save for John) at the most crucial moment of salvation history, the Holy Spirit no less guided Christ in choosing those twelve for the ends He desired than He did at Vatican II for the ends He desired there.
I would agree with your sentiment regarding then-Cardinal Ratzinger's statement if bishops spoke with infallibility where personal opinion is involved. If he says it as the Vicar of Christ, I will high-five you and eat humble pie.
But I'm pretty dang sure he won't.
I'd say the show-stopper is in the claim that one must be one or the other, but can't be both. Since, presumably, traditional Catholicism (as defined by you) is authentic, the inevitable conclusion is that by your lights, "conciliar" Catholics are not.
So the question arises: if a conciliar Catholic presented himself for Holy Communion at a trad chapel, would he be allowed to receive? If yes, WHY?
Mea culpa. <blush>
Never.
The Church has changed its fundamental teaching on this matter, and cannot turn back.
Banality is a subjective opinion. I know Catholics who think the rosary is an incredibly banal devotion due to its repetition of the same prayer, over and over again. It makes it no less holy.
Some people think Mass itself is boring. Meanwhile, the priest is turning bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ up at the altar. So what's banal and what isn't banal?
I agree, in my personal opinion, the novus ordo is not my exact cup of tea, but that doesn't mean the novus ordo is bad, any more than the rosary can be called bad because the act of repeating the Hail Mary fifty times causes people to fall asleep while they're saying it.
Pope John the 22nd. (not the 23rd) preached from the pulpit that no one who had already died was in the presence of God. But that they would only see God after the final judgment.
He was questioned, rebuked and resisted in this error by his own subordinates until finally on his deathbed he recanted.
His preaching and ideas were not an act of the Magisterium.
Could you elaborate?
The Church cannot change a fundamental teaching: "Christ did not teach a determined body of doctrine applicable to all times and all men, but rather inaugurated a religious movement adapted or to be adapted to different times and places." --Condemned. Pius X Lamentabili Sane.
So you're saying the pope is NOT infallible in matters of morals and faith? You're saying he taught heresy?
Or is there more to this story?
If it's the former, then the Church is built on sand, not on Peter. If it's the latter, then it doesn't apply here.
No. In fact, I parsed out the statement to show that your interpretation is off-base. You come to conclusions that are not there. They criticized the abuses that have taken place, not the substance of the Council itself.
Paul rebuked Cephas (Peter), the first Pope. By your logic, I guess he was displaying a "lack of faith."
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