Posted on 05/02/2005 12:03:36 PM PDT by murphE
Thanks for posting that. I'm just curious as to at what point God has suspended the free will of the Pontiff in order to prevent him from being in error.
As far as the second quote you gave from Bellarmine. That is a very temporal statement he refers to with his reference to Lutherans.
Today's circumstances are quite different from then.
By God's permission the majority of bishops and prelates can credulously be seduced by their pastors and then pass it along to the credulous masses.
Yet the principle still applies. Even the more learned sedevacantists (eg the www.traditionalmass.org types) make egregious errors in their explanation of the Pontiff's purported "heresies".
Worse yet are www.novusordowatch.org and other such persons. The latest I saw on NOW was that B-16 was a heretic for his proposal that the Lutherans could be restored to the Church by means of suitable adding to the Augsburg Confession, sort of a completion of all the Catholic elements that were missing. Left unmentioned in the denunciation of his 'heresy' (and I'm sure Ratzinger discussed this in the preceding pages), is that this idea has been floating around among Catholic churchmen since the 16th century.
Those dissenters who reject in practice the lawful authority of the supreme pastor of the Church, in defiance of Sacred Tradition as taught by the magisterium at Vatican I and going back to the apostles, have been awfully quiet since the passing of the late pontiff, whom they never ceased to unfairly malign as unorthodox in the most scandalous ways possible. I had thought they might see sense now that the Holy Spirit has actually elected a Pope who has written extensively on some of the problems of the liturgical reform, and who issued Dominus Iesus condemning relativism in religion and overall upheld the faith. But no, it would appear that at least Messrs. Matt and Ferrara have gone back to their old tricks of lecturing the Pope and telling the magisterium that it must measure up to their subjective interpretation of Tradition or else. I had hoped there might have been an opening with the advent of our Holy Father Benedict XVI, and perhaps there still could be one, but it would require an immense change of heart from the proud schismatics who do not acknowledge the role of the magisterium in the interpretation of doctrine, and who need to realize that not every single practice in existence in the Church in 1962 was part of the unchanging deposit of faith handed down from the apostles. They would be better off acknowledging in practice the legitimate authority of the Holy Father, submitting to his authority (as was said must be in my eponymous papal bull), and working positively within the Church to help restore reverence in the liturgy, condemn false compromising ecumenism (as opposed to true ecumenism that seeks good relations with others where we can agree), and promote a correct understanding of Vatican II as part of Tradition and not in opposition to it, rather than trying to pull down the Church and promote schismatic parallel structures.
Did the gates of hell prevail April 3, 2005 through April 18, 2005?
I was amused to see, in the opening party of their letter, these "loyal traditionalists" praise the new Holy Father for the text of the Blessing he chanted, "Urbi and Orbi," [to the City and to the World] after the announcement presenting him on the loggia of St. Peter's.
They said that such sentiments had not been heard in years.
I guess they would be shocked to find out that the ancient formula used - and the modern book containing it - have now been made official in the first official book of conclave rites to be published in centuries - precisely by a man whom most of the Traditionalists despise:
Archbishop Piero Marini, is chief among the Papal Masters of Ceremonies and the head of the "Officium de Liturgicis Ceebrationibus Summi Pontificis" (Office of Liturgical Celebrations of the Supreme Pontiff) and was responsible for compiling both the Ordo Exsequiarum Romani Pontificis (Order of Burial Rites for the Roman Pontiff) and the Ordo Rituum Conclavis (Order of the Rites of Conclave), both of which were approved by Pope John Paul II in 1998 and which are easily available from the Vatican Bookstore (www.paxbook.com).
He is also a first rate scholar on the history and theology of Roman liturgy: he's the one who made sure that ancient form of Blessing would be the FIRST BLESSING and new Pope gives; he's also responsible for restoring the Pallium to its more ancient form (the new Pallium with the red crosses that Pope Benedict received).
The Traditionalists, no doubt, would be shocked to find that someone they consider a "Novus Ordo litnik" actually did all the work to bring those rites to fruition.
A false parallelism. To entirely blame the Novus Ordo for the lack of attendance or priestly shortages is a false presumption.
The stated purpose of the Novus Ordo was to reinvigorate the Mass, encourage "active participation" and appeal to Protestants. The Novus Ordo did not have the desired effect.
Because these developed parallel doesn't mean that one contributed to the other.
It also doesn't mean they happened independently of one another.
The problems that so many mention that followed Vatican 2 were already within the Church and society.
And Vatican II blew the lid off of them and allowed them free reign in the Church.
Do you blame the sexual revolution on Vatican 2, also?
Had the Church remained firm and loosened none of the disciplines at the time, I believe the sexual revolution would have been restrained, especially among Catholics.
And the Vietnam protests?
No. That situation was mainly Paul VI's fault. His meddling in affairs while being suckered by Metropolitan Nikodim allowed the VC to re-arm for the Tet Offensive. Paul VI cost the U.S. that war.
Don't you think society itself had something to do with overthrowing authority and doing away with the reverant?
And the Church allowed itself to be dictated to by the society.
Why do you think the Church felt the need to write "The Church in the Modern World?" Because the Church was losing relevance - BEFORE Vatican 2.
As Malcolm Muggeridge stated just before Vatican II the world was ready to convert to Catholicism and suddenly The Catholic Church converted to the World. Paul VI prior to the council when he was Pius XII's secretary stated that the Church was never in finer shape. The Church didn't feel the need to write "the Church in the Modern World" modernists in the Church felt the need to write it.
I would say the problems are more complex than your simple conclusion that the changing of the Mass to the vernacular and putting in inclusive language is behind all of the Church's problems.
The Novus Ordo is not the Traditional Latin Mass put into the vernacular. To compare the two and see which one expresses the doctrine of the Church better is like night and day.
I disagree with that liturgical move, but to say it is THE cause of the problem doesn't make sense.
I didn't say that. I responded to the assertion that no one is clamoring for the TLM. As you said, the problems existed in the Church prior to Vatican II. But Vatican II ended all resistance to those problems.
I would point more to the dissent within the American Church in implementing ACTUAL Vatican 2.
Had there been no Vatican II,there would not have been a "spirit of Vatican II" so the excuse for the dissent would not be there. Plus, this a worldwide problem, not an exclusively American one. And as a final point, Vatican II did not mandate the Novus Ordo. So an actual implementation of Vatican II could happen while scrapping the NO.
"Actually the Novus Ordo should be defined as "the optional Vernacular Rite of Paul VI" and the inaccurate term "Tridentine" should be recognized as the only "Latin Rite.""
An interesting observation where Novus Ordo suddenly becomes the Latin Rite, thus devaluing the Traditional Mass, and which Anglicans happily use as an alternative to the Book of Common Prayer. No doubt this universality in practice is not lost on the new pope which will ensure its survival and be worthy of more tinkering to reflect papal quirkiness and evolving social expression. To suggest that the Traditional Mass can coexist with Novus Ordo is like comparing heaven with hell.
You might say, when asked if JPII would restore a few token traditions his response was, "Over my dead body"
He certainly wasn't anxious to do anything traditional during his calamitous pontificate.
Thanks for your post. It appears that Ratzinger will retain Marini as Papal Master of Ceremonies, which is a good thing.
Your stupid analogy aside, this is why I favor a Tridentine Rite. Simply granting a universal indult will be taken by some as a mandate for the TLM. Even more resentment will be created when bishops and priests continue to refuse to celebrate it.
The TLM deserves a canonical jurisdiction that is free from arbitrariness. That won't happen outside an apostolic administration that is separate from the diocesan bishops.
Only if you think topless female "readers" during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is a good thing.
Obidience to what? Its one thing to be in a diocese with Bishops like Cardinal George in charge, who, despite various problems, try to be in line with Rome, its another thing to be in a diocese with Bishops like Cardinal Mahoney.
Obidience? Sorry, I think the burden of obidience is on the Bishops first.
Could be...
Oh come on! You act like that's a common thing. I'd say the things that are common and destructive should be focused on, instead of something that is very rare.
The problem with Catholics of his ilk is they seem to short circuit their logic process(and by the same token, ones like Ultima Radio have the same lapses of logic). To be, too many faithful Catholics are blindly obidient, no matter what, despite the fact the clergy may be anything but obidient, yet they defer to Judas like clergy and Bishops. To me, as Rod Dreher has mentioned on Amy Welborns blogs comment boxes, its one thing to be signle to try to keep the faith, but when ones family is involved the stakes become far higher. Should we defer to "obidience" to hetrodx clergy and bishops and watch their faith wither away? The same excapt thing took place in Holland and look at the results there.
I am 100% convinced Novus Ordo Watch is set up to make those who honestly perfer the TLM to look bad.
I happen to think sacrilege at Papal Masses have been a very common thing.
Check out the canonization Mass of St. Juan Diego and the beatification Mass of Mother Theresa. Marini invents something new, each and every time.
"Mischief is my name, novelty is my game."
It's in this letter.
That person was implying that this was the authors' position, you seemed to be doing the same by quoting it, which meant you didn't read the letter.
Sedevacantists should explain their position. If you are one, please explain
I am not. No one on this thread at that point had taken that position, including the authors of the letter, so what does sedevacanism have to do with this thread?
What are they "dissenting" from actually?
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