There's been a wide variety of bible translations and liturgies developed over the 2000 year history of Christianity and they all have their strengths and weaknesses. Some of the holiest figures in church history had nothing to do with latin litugries, including the apostles themeselves. The sooner Christians stop this "my the way or the highway" attitude, the better.
As an agnostic I can hardly be referred to as a “traditionalist” what ever that means...although i can certainly guess. I’m an ex-catholic history buff who cannot afford the indulgence’s necessary for the Vatican to smooth my path to a guaranteed eternal salvation. I’ll have to try to get there on my own.
As an agnostic I can hardly be referred to as a “traditionalist” what ever that means...although i can certainly guess. I’m an ex-catholic history buff who cannot afford the indulgence’s necessary for the Vatican to smooth my path to a guaranteed eternal salvation. I’ll have to try to get there on my own...but that’s how I roll, so there’s hope.
“What they both have in common in the thing they’re proclaiming as THE only acceptable form didn’t even exist until the late 1600s.”
While you are correct that the Council of Trent standardized the Roman Mass in the 16th Century, the elements of the Mass in Europe, e.g., the prayers of the daily office, the chants of the Mass (developed in 7th-10th centuries) were all in place.
Other contemporaneous rites, like the Sarum Rite or the Ambrosian Rite were more similar to the Tridentine Rite than not, and would probably be quite acceptable to the devotee of TLM.
Those of us who cherish the Tridentine Rite prefer the solemnity of the rite, the strict attention to the rubrics of the Mass, the beauty of the prayers, and the sacredness of the music.
In addition, because priest and congregation tend to be conservative, the sermons tend to uphold our values: family, the sacrednesslife, personal responsibility: these sermons are heavy on the teaching of the theology of Catholicism and lack the superficiality and touchy-feelyness of many modern homilies.
Consequently, at the TLM, I find myself eagerly anticipating the sermon as opposed to my usual dread of the banality of too many “relevant to the times” modern homilies.
For me, this is the liturgical equivalent of listening to a discussion of strict interpretation of the Constitution rather than one dealing with the Constitution as a “living, breathing document.”
All this having been said, most of the Catholics that I know who have opted for the TLM do not deny the validity of the Novus Ordo; it is just that the Novus Ordo Mass tends to leave us unfulfilled. However, most of us do attend Novus Ordo Mass when the TLM is unavailable, as on holydays when we are working and away from our home parishes.