Posted on 07/08/2007 4:56:55 PM PDT by narses
VATICAN CITY Pope Benedict XVI on Saturday removed restrictions on celebrating the old Latin Mass, reviving a rite that was all but swept away by the liberalizing reforms of the Second Vatican Council. The decision, a victory for traditional, conservative Roman Catholics, came over the objections of liberal-minded Catholics and angered Jews because the Tridentine Mass contains a prayer for their conversion. ... In addition to Jewish concerns, bishops in France, and liberal-minded clergy and faithful elsewhere expressed concerns that allowing freer use of the Tridentine liturgy would imply a negation of Vatican II and create divisions in parishes since two different liturgies would be celebrated.
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
As a long time Episcopalian, I have a soft spot in my heart for the Anglican 4 part chant - but the Gregorian chant is sung scripture in absolute purity. Completely awesome in the strictest sense of that word.
Fortunately our choirmaster is a musical expert who loves chant and Renaissance polyphony as well as the better Baroque classics. So we have been singing a lot of Latin for a long time (the Ordinary of the Mass is sung in Latin at the main service on the 1st Sunday of every month. The congregation has learned it quite well and is singing along with enthusiasm from printed handouts).
(I think the seminaries still do this..)
Gee, now there is an intelligent response.
Your anger is appropriate for one outside God's love (ie His Church). Telling a priest "F you", even a lib priest, is still a gross lack of respect for the office, and a sentiment we don't need in the Church Christ founded. If you are going to let the evil of our enemies infest you, better that you stay away from the faithful then be a cause of scandal.
Amend your heart or tie a mill-stone around it, but don't waist time by frothing obscenities and mocking the Vicar of Christ. You mock His servants and you mock Him.
It's H.H. Richardsonian Romanesque Revival, but it's got the reverb. When the sanctuary is empty, it has a hang time of almost 8 seconds. That drops, of course, when it's full of people, but it's still MOST impressive. Chant sounds great!
Perfect!
Liberals are upset by this? Not surprising!
No, I don’t have all the answers. And you are correct, I don’t need a church. Not one that insults, mocks and trivializes something so deep and personal as faith.
I know that there is a lot I will have to answer for, but I did fuight as best I could.
And from a purely technical view, I believe that is correct. Episcopalians used to not be "Protestant" in the strictest sense of the word. Nowadays, of course, they ARE screaming moonbat heretics, which is why we are now Catholics.
But in the old days we caught flak from both sides -- the Catholics looked at us as "Catholic Lite" at best, while the "real" Protestants thought we were, if not the Scarlet Woman, at least her handmaiden.
The only insulting, mocking, or trivializing I see here was started by the person you see in the mirror.
"Clown?" "Nuts!"? That's over the line, you deserve whatever you think you got.
Much more cerebral than that garbage you posted.
“Ratzinger participated in the Council, but he, like many others, thought that the renewal of the Mass that was being considered would be the generalization of things like the restoration of Gregorian chant, perhaps a dialogue mass where the people said the altar boys responses, and a few minor changes. He was not one of the Bugnini party and was not powerful enough to have done anything to stop Bugnini. Obviously, nobody else was, either, including Paul VI.”
Read the history of Vatican II. Ratzinger was decidedly a player, along with Bugnini, who he outranked. This nonsense of not being able to stop it was tried at Nuremburg. It didn’t work then and it doesn’t wash here.
The point of my posting(s) is that what Liberals did to Catholicism is the same thing they are doing to the Republic. Yet most here seem perfectly happy to roll over.
You're not alone. We had a priest start walking up the aisle wearing a baseball cap to somehow support one of the grade school sports teams. I noticed it, but was too young to understand this was not normal. It was not long after the parents moved to a different parish. That priest, a few years later, was convicted of molestation. I also recall this freak doing some odd hand puppet thing at the altar during a NO Mass. Very weird. More Novus Ordo experimento for you I suppose.
Another nice thing is that an altar rail could be installed and the altar moved back to the roodscreen (and the tabernacle placed in the niche in the center of the roodscreen) with a minimum of fuss . . . . don't think that will happen on the current rector's watch, but he left the options open . . . .
Shame on you. You can disagree with the Church without being disrespectful and imitating the very liberals you pretend to despise by spreading slander around.
When I was studying in France in the 1970's, I was pleasantly surprised to find that in other countries the liturgical traditions were not abandoned and prayerful music without guitars was the norm.
I am a recent convert to Catholicism. I cant wait for my first Latin Mass, but since I am not familiar with it, can anyone recommend a source that would help me to understand it better? As for a good book to help you understand it, I would recommend the following: Fortescue, Adrian, The Mass: A Study of the Roman Liturgy. Fitzwilliam NH: Loreto (2005). Reprinted from Longmans (1912). This is a tremendous resource that explains the development of the Liturgy from Apostolic times until the (then) present. However, one thing to realize is that most post Vatican 2 Catholics have a fundamental defect in their education when it comes to the theology of the Mass. And this defect is not limited to the laity: it includes a tremendous number of priests, as well. This is not so much the fault of the Novus Ordo Mass, but is the fault of those who taught the celebration of that Mass as well as those who taught religious education to children. The Mass is the memorial of Our Lord's passion. This part is taught very effectively in most places. We see that from the figure given us at the Last Supper. We can immediately reconcile that with the traditional Jewish Seder meal. It is absolutely correct. However, it is only part. The Communion Rite illustrates this figure well. As it stands, Protestant communion rites (so to speak) do the same thing. But that does not explain the Eucharist. And the bigger piece of that is lost upon most modern Catholics (unfortunately, it appears to me that this loss includes many in the clergy). The Mass is also the re-presentation of Our Lord's passion. While most Catholics will be able to parrot this, they do not fully comprehend the words they speak. (Note: that does not include the majority of the members of the Free Republic Catholic Caucus -- probably the best collection of an educated laity within the American Church). I'm sure you recognize that God speaks in figures throughout His history. Hebrews 9:9 speaks about the Old Testament sacrifices being a figure for the time now present. The Mass is a continuation of the offering that Christ made of Himself when he was slain on Calvary. Rev 5:6 speaks to the lamb standing as if it had been slain. The wounds He took upon Himself have not healed, but He lives. Rev 13:8 discusses the Lamb slain from the foundation of the age. (Note: modern translations of that verse obfuscate this: you need to look at the Greek to see it clearly). These truths become abundantly apparent in the Holy Mass. But it is far too easy for these truths to be hidden in the Novus Ordo; it is impossible to hide them in the traditional Mass. In both the Novus Ordo and the traditional Mass, the priest calls on the Holy Spirit to transubstantiate the bread and wine into the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Our Lord. But I feel that many of the Novus Ordo priests do not fully appreciate what they are doing as they do so. They equate the Altar with the Table of the Lord. I know for a certainty that most of the Faithful have this perception. This lack of perception is, in my humble opinion, why the majority of them use the shorter Eucharistic Prayers rather than the Roman Canon. They want to get it over with so that they can get to the important part: communion. I get the distinct opinion (and it may be unfounded in many cases) that they believe that they do the consecration for the purpose of distributing the Body and Blood of Christ during Communion. And that is a true pity. In both rituals, there are two separate oblations. How many people realize that? How many people only consider the oblation of the bread and wine to God prior to the consecration? What about the oblation of the Victim to God? The offering of our prayers over our Victim Lord, present upon the altar (not table, altar) and then the elevation of the victim, offering Him to God? (IMHO, that moment is the absolute highlight of the Mass) Consider the elevations. The first elevation is to show the Victim to the Faithful present. This is done once the Body and Blood are consecrated. But why the second elevation at the end of the Eucharistic Prayer? Why is Our Lord elevated again? Giving people one more chance to adore? (Looking at how most N.O. masses are celebrated, one would think so: the priest looks straight ahead and lifts the Body and Blood of Our Lord...as if saying, look again, people...) The second elevation is where the priest elevates the Victim and offers the Victim to God! There is one place for the priest's eyes at that moment: heavenward! All of our prayers, all of our sins, all of our wishes should be with the priest, as he raises the Victim to God, offering Him as a perfect offering for the salvation of the world. This is the supreme, heavenly precision with which the Mass should be offered: the priest, acting in persona Christi capitas, offers Christ to God as a continuation of that eternal offering that is going on even now in heaven. We are thus elevated to heaven in the process, participating in the divine and perfect worship that God has laid forth: foreshadowed in the Old Testament and ongoing in Heaven until the devil and sin are cast into the lake of fire and the New Jerusalem descends. Just as in the OT, where the priests would then dine on the sacrifices made, we have the opportunity to dine on the perfect sacrifice: the Lamb of God. Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: and we must eat of this passover to benefit fully from it. But just as the meal was not the purpose of the passover sacrifice in the OT, the communion is not the purpose of the Mass. The offering of the sacrifice to God is the purpose. Enough on the above. The point is that to really appreciate either Mass...but particularly the "Extraordinary Form," understanding the theology of it is critical. Far more important than understanding linguistic differences. And so the advice I'd offer is for you to study the theology of the Mass so that, when you go, you will have a full apprecation of what you are witnessing. |
Have you read “The Bugnini Liturgy and the Reform of the Reform,” by Laszlo Dobszay? It’s not exactly stimulating reading, but it explains many things (in great detail!) that were part of the Bugnini agenda.
Furthermore, while Bugnini had gotten himself into a place where he had a lot of power, he had it only because he had lots of evil supporters within the Church in general and the Vatican in particular.
I am always torn when I think of Paul VI. I was at his Mass at Yankee Stadium, and I still remember this very thin figure in a vestments coming out onto the podium they had set up in the middle of the field and raising his hands and turning around to everyone, blessing. We Catholics thought this was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened. I went there and back on the subway, and almost everybody on the train was Catholic and going to/coming from the mass. It was a truly wonderful moment and we could never have imagined what was going to happen in only a couple of years.
But in all fairness, I don’t think Paul VI knew or imagined, either. The Devil like a roaring lion goes about seeking whom he may devour. The Devil was loosed in the Church at that time, and I think unfortunately Paul VI was not up to resisting him. That is, he didn’t approve; but he didn’t fight back.
Of course, after death when we see the answers to all the questions and how things are laid out (I certainly hope Our Lord is planning on some explanations), we may understand this. But it was agony for those of us who lived through it, and I would suspect it was pretty awful for Joseph Ratzinger, too. In the MP, he even mentions this feeling.
Thank you.
Amen to that. The argument for the guitar mass is that it appeals to the young, but why should music in the 60's folk music style appeal to the young? It's like listening to a friggin' Peter, Paul, and Mary concert during PBS pledge week!!!
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