[ultima ratio]

Two points. First, why should the larger culture matter? Do you think the Church didn't have its hands full during the Roman Empire? Do you think the Church had it easy during and after the French Revolution? The Church has always had to buck the larger culture. But it has always stuck to its principles and beliefs, even through persecution. It never joined forces with the larger culture.

Second, if Catholics like being Protestants, then let them become Protestants and leave. Catholicism is a faith. It adheres to certain doctrinal truths. Traditionalists ask only that these be given their due in Catholic theological, cultural and liturgical life. If nominal Catholics can't accept this, then let them go elsewhere--which is what the modernists more or less told traditionalists to do in 1970. It was then that millions upon millions walked away--though nobody in liberal Rome seemed to give a damn.

[Desdemona]

First, why should the larger culture matter? ...it has always stuck to its principles and beliefs, even through persecution. It never joined forces with the larger culture.

The larger culture matters because people are human. It's going to invade whether you like it or not. I don't know that the church itself has joined forces with the larger culture. If it has, there would be no Holy Days. I think the larger culture has impacted people's practicing of their faith and not in a good way.

if Catholics like being Protestants, then let them become Protestants and leave.

Oddly enough, the people I know who are closer to Protestants in thought and practice and taste are daily Mass goers and Rosary sayers. How's that for irony. Seriously though, just try to suggest that they go protestant. Just try.