Posted on 08/04/2005 2:11:09 PM PDT by Teófilo
A response to Father Joseph O'Leary's The Rise of the Neocaths.
Folks, I want to share with you a detailed commentary of Fr. Joseph O'Leary's essay, The Rise of the Neocaths, which you may read at his blog. The Spirit of Vatican II. Needless to say, the essay has captured the attention of many in the Catholic Blogosphere, and also brought out responses from the best known members of our community, such as Dr. Phillip Blosser (The Pertinacious Papist), his son Christopher (Against the Grain) and Apolonio Latar III, among others.
As a lesser light of St. Blog's, mostly reflecting the light of others, I've decided to throw my hat into the ring and make a point-by-point commentary and response to Fr. O'Leary's essay. I guess that since he's trying to define me, I might as well take away his cards and define myself. His words are in blue and block-quoted, with my comments following below each paragraph. I foresee this will be a three or four part reply.
In a strong article in THE JAPAN MISSION JOURNAL, Autumn 2005, Edmund Chia draws attention to one of the most disturbing phenomena in Roman Catholicism today. He speaks of a younger generation that is "becoming more and more traditional and conservative in their thought patterns" and which Newsweek magazine refers to as the JP2 generation. Andrew Greeley discusses the same phenomenon under the heading "Young Fogeys" in Atlantic, Jan.-Feb. 2004.Framing the argument in terms of generational conflict is telling. Baby boomers such as Fr. O'Leary, or gurus to baby-boomers like Fr. Greeley, find themselves today leading an aging population of liberal boomers who are as conservative in their 60's dogmas as their parents were before them with their own worldviews. Thus, Frs. O'Leary and Greeley are puzzled and angry that they can't keep a large young audience Neither Fr. O'Leary nor Fr. Greeley are used to be seen as passé by any segment of Catholic public opinion, even less the younger generation who these good priests thought would be their natural constituency.
Yet, there's more to this than a mere generational gap. It is not solely a matter of children rebelling against their parents. Maybe it is because the 60's ideas were not all good in terms of their consistency, coherency, or consequences. Maybe we don't like the world Fr. O'Leary is leaving to us and that by itself deserves a critical approach. Fr. O'Leary does not dwell too much on the real reason why we reject him and his confreres.
Indeed the one person most responsible for bringing the Neocath generation into existence is John Paul II. I saw the beginning of it in Ireland at the beginning of October, 1979. When the Pope delivered the words, "Young people of Ireland, I bless you, I love you", the youthful crowd roared for twenty minutes until Fr Michael Cleary, the emcee, called on them to quieten down. Even amid the euphoria of Ireland's first papal visit, voices were raised to denounce this as crowd-manipulation. It is said that the Pope viewed the film of the scene over and over again in the Vatican.The late Servant of God Pope John Paul the Great—you can certainly see where I'm leaning—was blessed with a gift for communication , but foremost, with an unparalleled moral authority supported by a holy life dedicated to combat all the pagan ideologies that under the guise of different totalitarian systems threatened to destroy us throughout the 20th century. Pope John Paul II was a scholar, a pastor, a philosopher, a theologian, a worker, an athlete, an actor, a poet, a priest, a bishop, a Vatican II father, even a Catholic feminist. He was all the things the Left holds as paradigmatic and yet, they hate him, and in that "they" I include Fr. O'Leary, who dismisses this man's magnetism as he would that of a rock star surrounded by fanatical groupies blinded to the threat he presents.
Why is this? Why do they hate Pope John Paul the Great? Because Fr. O'Leary—and Küng, Greeley, among others—cannot accept the fact that the Pope considered himself to be in a very real way the principal interpreter of the Second Vatican Council, of its documents and legacy. Pope John Paul brought to an end the pretensions held by many tenured theologians that they were also part of the Church's Magisterium. Pope John Paul II moved the Church away from the amorphous "spirit of Vatican II" and put her firmly on the objective basis of what the Council really said, not on what it was purported to say. Fr. O'Leary et al. resent that Pope John Paul effected this needed change in direction without him asking their leave.
A stunning essay by Alberto Melloni, the distinguished Italian church historian, in a recent issue of RECHERCHES DE SCIENCE RELIGIEUSE, accuses John Paul II of making his voyages the main form of his magisterium, and substituting a cult of mediatic images for substantive educative communication. (The entire issue of the review, dedicated to the need of a new Ecumenical Council, is worth reading closely.)Again, it is the rock star accusation, the theory that the Showman must be dismissed as lacking substance and as mesmerizing his gullible followers. Fr. O'Leary apparently thinks that we can't read the Magisterium of the late Pope by ourselves, or that if we can, that we are somehow unable to understand it, some glib, selected quotes aside. But is not only his words, is also his example, captured in so many biographies— for example, that of Tad Szulc and the one by George Weigel—that I've been privileged to read, in Spanish and English. John Paul's aura was captivating precisely because of his exemplary holy life, and holy death. Absent these qualities, then, Fr. O'Leary would be right, it was all a show. The fact that John Paul's life stands this scrutiny grates on Fr. O'Leary.
Throughout the world, the most visible face of Church and of Christianity for a quarter of a century was that of the travelling Pope, and his privileged target audience in every country was the youth. What psychological need drew them to this super-father-figure?"Super-father-figure?" Another telling remark, instilled with Freudian overtones. What's the implication here? Was the adulation young people heaped on the late Pontiff but a manifestation of unresolved Oedipal tendencies on a mass scale? Was the late Holy Father but a more down-to-earth epiphany of the great Sky Father we all neurotically project as the great solution to all our problems?
Perhaps I'm overstating Fr. O'Leary's argument. It's just that I don't like the good priest's amateur attempt to subject "neo-catholics" to a global pop-psych diagnosis. Us so called "neocaths" deserve better.
My Church will be a lot better off when Fr. O'Leary and his generation are sitting in nursing homes, where they can do no more damage to society. I'm a "neo-Catholic" because I'm not impressed by the garbage that came out of the 1960s? I'll wear the label with pride!
What he calls "neo-Catholics" are merely Catholics who accept the teaching of the Church. As a dissenter does he want to deny people the right to believe what the Church teaches and has always taught? It seems to me that the theological "liberals" are misnamed and the intolerant ones here.
I don't know how old this guy is - if he's actually a Baby Boomer, he can't be over 59 (born in 1946).
The real damage was not done by his generation, but by people about 10-15 years older. I'm a Boomer, and we suffered under the misguided (at best) "leadership" of people who were probably born in the 1930s and are now in their 70s and beyond. Look at the age of some of the truly notorious pedophile priests - many of them are now in their mid-to-late 70's. Many people of my generation simply left the Church because of priests and bishops like that, who were all, naturally, older than we were.
The unfortunate thing is that those who stayed were often not the brightest and best, and the corrupt older clergy attracted a truly lame group of dysfunctional and frequently gay Boomers into the clergy.
One thing we have to examine is why and how the Church, which looked so good in the 1950's, was harboring these vipers in its breast without knowing it. As soon as they got the "go" signal from VatII, they took off and wreaked havoc.
Sorry to sound so obsessive about this, but younger people who didn't live through VatII (as the "Boomers" did) can't imagine how horrible it was. We were brought up with one Church, and suddenly, overnight, it was all taken away from us and everything was in ruins.
While I blame the generation directly before, I think there were many good people among them who were also devastated by this. The question is how the "reformers" got so powerful so fast, and how they were able to suppress or drive out anyone who disagreed with them.
Aside from the obvious influence of the Evil One, there must be some historical explanation for this. Any ideas?
"The real damage was not done by his generation, but by people about 10-15 years older....
Aside from the obvious influence of the Evil One, there must be some historical explanation for this. Any ideas?" by livius
Look beyond just the Roman Catholic Church. I lived through it all as well, but as an Anglican not a Roman Catholic. But my experience was the same, a spiritual universe falling apart all around me. Others in other denominations experienced the same things and the self-destruction of all of these denominations continues today.
Every time I dare to suggest a historical reason, I get accused of trashing the Catholic Church. The problem historically, however, is not the Catholic Church. It's the West, Western culture itself. Look to what drives and has driven Western culture through the years.
A major factor could very well be the loss of a generation of leaders(the Lost Generation), in the Great War.
Fr. O'Leary was born in '49, according to his bio. Fr. Greeley was born in '28. Those of you who say that all the boomers are not to blame for the debacle, are right. I'm stereotyping too, somewhat.
But it wasn't me who frame the matter in terms of generational conflict. Fr. O'Leary did.
Thank you all for your comments. Second installment will be tomorrow.
-Theo
The cafeteria is closed; however, there are still a few left in line, tray in hand, reminiscing and complaining...
Personally, I think a lot of them made it in.
I'm not talking about individual misdeeds, btw - there have always been clergy whose personal lives were not exemplary, to say the least - but about the destruction of the liturgy, the teaching and sometimes even the faith of the Church. And that, in my mind, was brought to us by the people who "opened the windows" at Vatican II, all of whom were older than the generation of Catholics who came of age in the late 60's-early 70's.
Actually, I think the Catholic Church was the lynch-pin. Once the Church went - which it did by deciding to adapt itself to the culture, rather than the reverse - everything else went, too. All of the liturgical Protestant churches, for example, "revised" their liturgies at that time, and in many cases the results were as awful as they were in the Catholic Church. And traditional Protestant teaching on things like abortion, divorce, etc. went out the door immediately.
In the case of the Catholic Church, I think there was some serious "burrowing from within" going on. Perhaps these people were Communists or left-wing influenced, as all of American intellectual culture was at that time, or perhaps they were simply acting out of some perverse desire for power and the desire to be accepted by "the modern world."
Curiously, one of the things that made it easier for these evil people to take over was precisely that Catholics were very obedient and trusted the Church. They had been trained to be obedient to Rome, to their bishops, etc., and when corruption and heresy took over many of the episcopal thrones of this world, lay Catholics had no way of resisting.
Well ditto in the Episcopal Church.
But some have linked the whole thing to Jansenism and others, like Michael Davies, have drawn a comparison with 16th century England (Was the English Reformation under King Henry VIII pre-Jansenist maybe?). Anglican clergy were crawling all over the place as observers during the Vatican Council. Ideas and schemes were being traded both ways.
The big liturgical gun in the 60s was an Anglican at the Benedictine Convent at Nashdom, Dom Gregory Dix. He was required reading, probably still is, at all the major seminaries.
Another major force back then was the Taize Community in France.
I'm just throwing out some ideas to think about.
One major idea is this. The Catholic Church and Western culture are not seperable.
I hear strange stuff even went on in the Orthodox seminary, St. Vladimir's in NYC
Dom Gregory Dix - I haven't heard of him, but I'm assuming he was a "stripping of the altars" type of guy? There certainly were a lot of them on the loose at that time.
Yes, strange stuff did go on at St. Vlad's for a while. I had a friend who was a seminarian there at the time. But most of it involved a rather flamboyant clique of gay seminarians, and wasn't officially sponsored by the professoriate, at least.
I think you're right about the Catholic Church and Western culture being inseparable. I think we'll soon understand just how true this is now that Islam is, once again, baying at the gates.
"Dom Gregory Dix... a "stripping of the altars" type of guy? There certainly were a lot of them on the loose at that time"
I'm not sure. His SHAPE OF THE LITURGY, a history of the development of the Eucharistic liturgy published by Dacre Press, is considered the definitive study of the subject. I have read in it but have not read it cover to cover. I can tell you Dix was sent over to America after WWII as Father Prior of St. Gregory's Priory in Three River's, MI. After his return to Nashdom (or his death), the priory was raised to an abbey and the new abbott bought into all of the very latest changes that eminated from Vatican II. Nashdom, however, did not. At the Nashdom Abbey, I understand the Tridentine Mass is still celebrated the old way, and still in Latin. But the old abbey has been sold and the monks have moved into a facility at a different location.
Do you remember a cinema verite' film series about a bunch of monks in a monastery that was shown on PBS, "Essene"? That was filmed at St. Gregory's Abbey after all of the changes started.
When it comes to stripping the altars, I think Taize may have been very influential. I presume you're familiar with Taize.
I'd love to know who dreamed up the Mass facing the people nonsense other than this Bugnini guy. Purely Protestant, and I do mean radical Protestant. It drove as many out of the Episcopal Church as out of the Roman Catholic Church.
I hear strange stuff even went on in the Orthodox seminary, St. Vladimir's in NYC. Graves
Yes, strange stuff did go on at St. Vlad's for a while. I had a friend who was a seminarian there at the time. But most of it involved a rather flamboyant clique of gay seminarians, and wasn't officially sponsored by the professoriate, at least. Livius
The Dean of the seminary, Thomas Hopko, denied that the Birth of our Lord was virginal. Instead, he claimed the seal of the womb was broken during the Birth. Hopko had a big fan club in the Episcopal Church. In that same general time frame, the St. Vlad's Seminary Press published a book that sort of suggested love is God. Anglican Catholics panned it. And Hopko was wishy washy on ordination of women to the diaconate. http://hocna.org/defense/virgin.htm
So where did all of this jazz come from at St. Vlad's? Certainly not from the Tradition, not from Orthodoxy. But it did come from somewhere, and that somewhere was Western culture. Western culture seeped into St. Vladimir's and corrupted it. The same thing also happened at Holy Cross, the Greek Orthodox seminary in Boston.
Did you know that the Ecumenical Patriarch at the turn of the century, the one who accepted the Roman Catholic calendar and who recognized Anglican ordinations, was a notorious Freemason? He even got Masonic rites at his funeral. Did you know his election was rigged by the British foreign office? You can read all about it in THE STRUGGLE AGAINST ECUMENISM. http://www.stnectariospress.com/catalog/book_reviews.htm
I consider myself a neo-Catholic and I'm...well, we'll just say, past 50. ; ) I attend a very conservative traditional Mass, in the sense that it is a Novus Ordo parish (no Indult), where the Mass is offered in Latin complete with a schola singing Gregorian Chant and a choir which incorporates the great music written for the Church as part of the Liturgy. Our congregation is well represented by younger families as well as us baby-boomers. It is true that most people in the suburbs attend parishes of varying degrees of "heresy," the wealthiest seem to be the worst in this regard. I suspect it is because the wealth of the Catholic Church in this Diocese (Detroit), is controlled by the very liberal Presbyteral Council and the choice parishes go to the priests who tow the progressive line.
I didn't know that about Hopko, although I knew he was popular with Episcopalians. Holy Cross, on the other hand, was fairly well known to have problems with orthodoxy (small o!).
Didn't know that about the Ecumenical Patriarch, either. The influence of Freemasonry is definitely one of those things that is underestimated. I spend a lot of time in Europe, where Catholics see the hand of the Lodge in everything, and I used to laugh at this. Americans tend to think of Masons as simply a bunch of local businessmen who have like to wear funny costumes and have a boys' night out every so often, but there's certainly a lot more to it than that. Supposedly, the current PM of Spain, Zapatero, who is attacking the Church from every direction, is a Mason.
I've noticed that, too. It may be, as you say, that the more heretically minded clergy get the "plum" assignments because they are the favorites of heretically-minded bishops. Whatever, it does seem to be true that the wealthier the parish, the less faithful it is.
"I didn't know that about Hopko, although I knew he was popular with Episcopalians. Holy Cross, on the other hand, was fairly well known to have problems with orthodoxy (small o!).
Didn't know that about the Ecumenical Patriarch, either"
Now if we had a Lutheran in this discussion, I'm sure we'd get a mouthful as to the work of the Baelzebub over there. So let's cross post to some other Anglicans, RCs, Lutherans, Orthodox and see what we get.
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