Posted on 03/30/2013 11:39:36 AM PDT by Brian Kopp DPM
In two weeks Pope Francis has done more to promote Summorum Pontificum than Pope Benedict did since the day he promulgated it.
After the decision by Pope Francis to wash the feet of two women on Holy Thursday, conservative Catholic priests and laypeople alike will now be looking for ways out of the dilemma posed by the foot washing rite of the Holy Thursday Mass.
The foot washing rite is actually optional, though that fact is little grasped by liberals who impose the options they like as obligatory on those who would prefer to opt out. Liturgical law prescribes that only men (viri in Latin) can be chosen for that rite. Priests who want to adhere to the law will find themselves facing fierce opposition by liberals demanding that women be included. Bishops will be hard-pressed to explain how priests should keep to the liturgical law when the Pope himself flouts it. By including women, the Pope has cast all liturgical laws into the hazard.
Priests who opt to omit the foot washing from Holy Thursday Mass will be seen – paradoxically – as dissenting from the law that clearly excludes women’s feet from being washed. To avoid the dilemma entirely, priests and lay Catholics who wish to see proper liturgical law observed will find a suitable option in the older form of the Roman Rite, the so-called “Tridentine” form emancipated in 2007 by Pope Benedict.
After Summorum Pontificum went into force, a clarifying document called Universae Ecclesiae was issued to help people interpret correctly how how to implement Pope Benedict’s provisions. Universae Ecclesiae says that all customs or liturgical practices not in force in 1962 (such as altars girls, communion in the hand and now, apparently, washing women’s feet), are not to be integrated into liturgies in the older form of the Roman Rite. Priests and lay Catholics who want Holy Thursday without dilemmas and controversies and fights about whose feet can be washed, have the legitimate option of the traditional Roman Missal which is, effectively, bullet proof.
Don’t kid yourselves. Many priests and lay Catholics are upset by the Pope’s move and the dilemma this poses at the local level throughout much of the western Church.
War-weary Catholics are back in the trenches, but they now have Summorum Pontificum. And Pope Francis has done more to promote Summorum Pontificum then Pope Benedict ever did.
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, 2013It’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?
You know who else consistently violated religious rules? Jesus. I am a cradle practical Catholic, but I have enough Protestant blood in me to approve of Pope Francis wanting to stip the Church of many unnecessary trappings and traditions. Ermine stolls, gold pectoral crosses, and a rule prohbiting washing the feet of women on Holy Thursday are not in any way necessary to the mission of the Church.
Are the “Ten”Commandments,”rules”? I am talking about positive human law. And canon law generally falls into this category.
There’s no excuse for “willfully ignorant”.
No, Robby. The Ten Commandments are just suggestions.
They are our brothers and sisters but not because they are Muslims.
With all due respect to canon law, the Ten Commandments are somewhat more axiomatic.
The appearance that Church rules and canon law are "Good enough for thee, but not for me." If the pope need not obey Church rules, why should any of us? If the pope can make the rubrics moot, why not your humble village pastor? If the pope can arbitrarily make up the rules as he goes along, why not the pro-choice pols and the LGBT crowd?
This has real implications in a world that rejects God and His rules.
Maybe its much ado about nothing. Maybe its Pharisaical.
But Christ said, "Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."
How is any given faithful Catholic to know which things the Church binds on earth can be arbitrarily ignored, and which are important? In an age when Catholics are so poorly catechized after 50 years of the "Spirit of VII," this type of action increases the confusion and gives a green light to dissent and liturgical abuse.
Canon (Church law) prohbits the washing of women’s feet as part of the Holy Thursday service on the basis that Jesus only washed the feet of the Apostles, who were all men. This also relates the the Church law that only men can become priests.
This rule, however, is not dogma - such as belief in the Triune God, eg. and the Pope has the right to change the Holy Thursday rule. Instead of opennly changing the law, Pope Francis just ignored it. Some people believe that this means Pope Francis is open to women priests or deacons. Others are upset b/c they think that rather than breaking the law, Pope Francis just should have changed it as it may invite other breaches of canon law.
I understand about the ladyfolk. Are there other aspects of this story that involve Pope Francis violating other rubrics or canons? I'm not talking about traditions (conducting the Mass outside of a church, etc.).
sitetest
Not that I'm aware.
That's all fine, but stripping unnecessary trappings is not comparable with breaking Church law. It's sends a bad signal to 1.2 billion Catholics implying that they don't have to follow Church law, and makes him a terrible role model for priests.
To be largely “willfully ignorant” of an event in the news is not something for which some needs to be excused.
Regarding Pope Francis, I’ve decided to intentionally not to pay too close attention to his actions and words for now. He’s new in his position. I might actually wait a whole month or something before I get ready to put him under a microscope and jump down his throat for misdeeds, real or imagined.
sitetest
>By including women, the Pope has cast all liturgical laws into the hazard.<
.
Although The Passion of Our Lord is the Gospel, it was sung by a woman in our church. Needless to say that she is neither a priest nor deacon.
I must admit, she has a fabulous voice and did a fantastic job.
I hope you can help me out with this.
Abortion is not wrong because the Church says so, correct? The Church says so because it is wrong.
Washing girl’s feet is wrong because the Church says so. But in this case, the Church does not say so because it violates the natural law, or even that it violates the deposit of faith, correct? It’s a man-made rule, which existed at one time for a purpose, and which Christ’s vicar may do with as he pleases, no?
The Pope could not - cannot - proclaim that abortion is OK, or that women can be priests.
But as to what priests should wear, or whose feet are washed - those are things he may decide at his pleasure, are they not?
John Paul I only got 33 days.
Okay. Thanks.
sitetest
That gets to the heart of the matter.
I was a protestant for 60 years, and while I confess that I believe all the truths that the Catholic church teaches, there is much I do not understand. I still have protestant reflexes.
How is any faithful Catholic to know which things the Church binds on Earth can be arbitrarily ignored?
I suppose the answer is, "none of them". But how you approach a font containing Holy Water and whether or not you can dismember infants in the womb are not at all the same thing.
Rubrics and customs are proclaimed by Christ's vicar to encourage the faithful. They are entirely invented out of human ingenuity, they have changed many times, and will do so again.
The commands of the natural law, expressed both as revelation and exegesis of scripture, are invariant. They never change, nor can they change.
Your "faithful Catholic" should have learned the difference by third grade.
I agree with you that, especially in America, there are adult Catholics who do not know the difference. There are even seminary graduates who apparently feel that varying a liturgical custom and murdering the innocence of a little boy are of the same order of importance.
But there is a difference, and the difference is very important.
Yes, but...
You obviously understand this distinction, but many Catholics do not.
Here's an example:
We oppose abortion because its a violation of natural law. Its always intrinsically evil.
But now our bishops tell us to be truly "pro-life," we must also oppose capital punishment. Why? Well, most would assume we must lump capital punishment alongside abortion in the pro-life world because capital punishment must be intrinsically evil, a violation of natural law. But guess what? Capital punishment is not intrinsically evil. Its just a prudential decision of our Pope JPII that we should oppose capital punishment, its not intrinsically evil, its not a violation of natural law. Never was, is not now, cannot be.
Confusing, isn't it? So is it prudent to lump opposition to capital punishment alongside opposition to abortion, when one is a intrinsically evil and one isn't, and very few if any Catholics grasp the difference, let alone care?
Most Catholics don't make or understand these fine distinctions, they just figure, heck, if the Church can say something is evil today, i.e., capital punishment, that in the past she said was perfectly acceptable, then all things are up for grabs, including things that once were always taught as evil becoming acceptable, like usury, or birth control, or gay marriage.
If we can eat meat on Fridays now, but we couldn't before, why can't we have women priests now, which we couldn't before?
If the pope can disregard the rules for washing women's feet without first changing the law, why can't a bishop ordain women without first having the law changed?
Catholics don't understand these distinctions any more, so the Pope's making rubrics moot sets up anarchy and confusion.
He might not intend that, but there it is nonetheless.
Have you read Ludwig Ott’s “Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma”? It’s a wonderful reference.
It contains a breakdown of the different levels of teaching authority, which clarified things greatly for me.
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