This traditionalist Catholic thought is was very moving.......
He washed someones feet?
The liberals continue to propagate their own images of traditionalist values. Their minds would explode if they realized that the pro marriage march was right after the soup kitchen preparation, and before meal time atthe homeless shelter.
We must be aghast at a pope following God’s teachings.
It is kinda early for the final straw. I didn’t even hear about the other straws.
I wonder if the Pope uses a straw?
Leftists really are desperate to believe, and have everyone else believe, that conservativism/traditionalism is crumbling all over - wife tells me the local priest washed a bunch of feet, both male and female, at the service last night - didn’t seem to set off any alarms around here at all......
The Pope is supposed to wear fancy clothing and engage in ostentatious displays of wealth?? This what Vatican II was about?? This is traditionalism??
They now see a humble Pope, washing people's feet, avoiding senseless display, actively serving others, and they turn up their nose?? Oh! That's not what the church is all about! Heavens!!
Who writes this stuff?
I am a traditionalist Catholic. He is my Pope.
This is a dishonest article written to attack the Catholic Church and give the impression that there is severe, irreconcilable conflict when in fact there are only small disagreements or no disagreement at all.
No one that I have heard of is “rankled by every gesture and every decision” of Pope Francis. The media coverage of the Catholic Church and the new Pope has without exception been negative, inaccurate and dishonest.
But, in characteristic form, he added: "What liberals forget in their present crowing is that even as Francis makes himself — and the church — more popular by projecting (a) compassionate image, he will simultaneously make it harder for them to criticize him when he reaffirms the doctrinal points they want him to overturn."
Not sure what to make of the new Pope's slightly transgressive acts of humble piety. Is he sucking up to liberal critics or is he playing a deeper game? Personally, I hope he has a Machiavellian streak as the traditionalist commenter quoted above seems to assert. Or, even better, I hope this is sincere at the deepest level and that he holds traditional understandings of Church doctrine with equal sincerity, to the chagrin of his current liberal cheerleaders.
Grasping for straws and trying to create conflict. There has been some controversy - which I’ve read about - over whether women should participate in the foot-washing, but I don’t actually know anyone who objects, and believe me, I know very traditional Catholics.
he has devastated traditionalist Catholics who adored his predecessor, Benedict XVI, for restoring much of the traditional pomp to the papacy.
***Humility has a way of showing ‘pomp’ to be spiritually worthless.
he has devastated traditionalist Catholics who adored his predecessor, Benedict XVI, for restoring much of the traditional pomp to the papacy.
***Humility has a way of showing ‘pomp’ to be spiritually worthless.
Well for the record, this Protestant loves the new Pope, and the previous two.
In the movie, the new Pope, IIRC, actually acted out in a Christian way, and gave away the wealth of the church to the needy.
The bureaucracy of the church...was astonished. And it resisted the new direction.
It upset the entire established order. But...but...you can't do that? Oh, yes, I can. And I am obligated to. And you do so, too.
An old movie. I think it was Anthony Quinn?
I remember very little of it, more's the pity.
There is an adage: Qui bene distinguit, bene docet, that is, someone who makes distinctions well, teaches well.
Distinguished canonist Ed Peters makes good distinctions about the Holy Father’s disregard for the Church’s duly promulgated law when he chose to wash the feet of women on Holy Thursday. My emphases and comments.
Retrospectives on the Mandatum rite controversies March 29, 2013
It’s a very big Church and there are many issues competing for the pope’s attention. Let me address just that issue I know something about, namely, ecclesiastical law, and try to talk sensibly about it. I’ll leave to finer minds the task of situating legal concerns in the wider ecclesial context.
For starters, perhaps Fr. Lombardi was misquoted or taken out of context when he apparently said, “the pope’s decision [to wash the feet of women on Holy Thursday] was ‘absolutely licit’ for a rite that is not a church sacrament.” That remark is confusing because it implies that liceity is a concept that applies only to sacraments; but of course, liceity is an assessment of any action’s consistency with applicable law (canon, liturgical, sacramental, etc). One would never limit questions of Mass liceity to, say, the matter used for the Eucharist or the words of institution (that is, the sacrament at Mass) [NB] as if all other rubrics were merely optional. No one understands liceity so narrowly, [ehem... I think some people do.] and so, as I say, we are probably dealing with an incomplete answer.
In any case, I think some conclusions can be drawn about the foot-washing incident already.
[Here is an obvious point that must be made to help liberals sober up a little.] 1. If liturgical law permitted the washing of women’s feet at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, [then] no one would have noticed the pope’s doing it. What was newsworthy (apparently, massively newsworthy) is that, precisely because liturgical law does not authorize it, the pope’s performance of the action was huge news.
2. I and many others have long been open to revising the Mandatum rite so as to permit the washing of women’s feet [I am not among them. However, Peters is making a different point...] although I understand that strong symbolic elements are in play and I might be under-appreciating arguments for the retention of the rite as promulgated by Rome. I take no position on that larger issue, it being ultimately a question for experts in other disciplines. My focus is on the law as issued by Rome (c. 838).
[We get to the crux of the canonical issue...] 3. Few people seem able to articulate when a pope is bound by canon law (e.g., when canon law legislates matters of divine or natural law) and when he may ignore it (e.g., c. 378 § 1 on determining the suitability of candidates for the episcopate or appointing an excessive number of papal electors contrary to UDG 33). Those are not hard cases. Most Church laws, however, fall between these two poles and require careful thinking lest confusion for—nay, dissension among—the faithful arise. Exactly as happened here. [In spades!] Now, even in that discussion, the question is not usually whether the pope is bound to comply with the law (he probably is not so bound), but rather [pay attention...], how he can act contrary to the law without implying, especially for others who remain bound by the law but who might well find it equally inconvenient, that inconvenient laws may simply be ignored because, well, because the pope did it. [That, ladies and gents, is the problem. Liberals are going to claim that because of what Francis did, they can do whatever they wish. Indeed, they will claim that others who uphold the clearly written law are wrong to up hold the law. They will, like gnostics, appeal to some vague super-principle which trumps all law (and reason).]
4. A pope’s ignoring of a law is not an abrogation of the law but, especially where his action reverberated around the world, it seems to render the law moot. [moot - "doubtful, theoretical, meaningless, debatable"] For the sake of good order, then [Peters' own recommendation...], the Mandatum rubrics should be modified to permit the washing of women’s feet or, perhaps upon the advice of Scriptural and theological experts, the symbolism of apostolic ministry asserted by some to be contained in the rite should be articulated and the rule reiterated. What is not good is to leave a crystal clear law on the books but show no intention of expecting anyone to follow it. That damages the effectiveness of law across the board.
Get that last point?
What is not good is to leave a crystal clear law on the books but show no intention of expecting anyone to follow it. That damages the effectiveness of law across the board.
This is a huge problem.
Liberals such as Michael Sean Winters, who does not in this matter seem to make distinctions at all, think that Peters and I are “obsessively focused on whether or not a bishop or priest can/should wash the feet of women during the Mandatum Rite in the Mass of the Lord’s Supper”. He is wrong. That’s just your usual liberal misappropriation of the situation.
Peters and I are actually concerned about the good order of the Church. A canonist and a man in Holy Orders ought to be. Winters, on the other hand, writes for the paper of record for dissenters and antinomians.
What this foot washing issue does is reveal how vast the gulf is now that divides those who maintain that order, law and reason are necessary in the Church and society and those who, like gnostics who possess secret powers of interpretation of even more secret teachings, apply super-principles which trump lesser matters such as reason, law and order.
The new gnostics (liberals) call upon “fairness” and feelings. There can be no valid response possible by argument or reason or precedent.
For a long time I have argued that we need a level of liturgical celebration which brings about an encounter with the transcendent, which cuts beyond our (by now) useless linear arguments. People today can’t follow a linear argument. You get to the end and they conclude, “That might be true for you…”. Now, however, we may be seeing more clearly, in reactions to what Francis is doing (not necessarily in what Francis is doing), the exaltation of the golden calf of immanence.
Have we entered an age of a new gnosticism, wherein only those who feel a certain way are the true authoritative interpreters?
If seeing images of the Pope washing the feet of women is the worst thing that happened to those observers that day... They’re living a life that needs a bit of shaking up. Jeeeze....
The Papacy - ostentious, elaborate ceremonies, elaborate dress.
Jesus Christ - humility, simple clothes (note purple robe supplied by Romans upon trial), had no home of his own, traveled by foot, wore sandles, plain robe.
St. Francis of Assissi - encouraged the priests that followed him to deny oneself the luxuries that the were accustomed in their families that they grown up in. (Priests did not come from the peasants).
Pope Francis is advocating the Papacy to be like St. Francis of Assisi. Not celebrities.
Poor pitiful leftists!
They believe that the denial of sodomite “marraige,” abortion, contraception, women priests, and fornication is just because Tradition gets in the way.
Francis is propounding Dogma in a best of ways and that will be the big upset for the destroyers.
Since when does Yahoo speak for catholics everywhere.
I consider myself a traditional catholic, and so far Francis seems ok to me.
13 It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.
2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. 5 After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.
6 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”
7 Jesus replied, “You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”
8 “No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.”
Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”
9 “Then, Lord,” Simon Peter replied, “not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!”
10 Jesus answered, “Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.” 11 For he knew who was going to betray him, and that was why he said not every one was clean.
12 When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. 13 “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. 15 I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16 Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17 Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.