"I've got a million of 'em!"
Posted on 05/26/2002 7:05:39 PM PDT by ELS
| Jersey City There was a time in the Roman Catholic Church, a generation ago, when codified rituals and whispered prayers embraced the mysterious power of God. In more recent days, the whispers have been of a more profane nature as Catholics from the occasional congregant to the Pope have wrestled with the painful issue of priests who sexually abuse children. The ensuing scandal - which is roiling the American Catholic Church as nothing else in its history - has prompted many to call for liberal reform in the church. Yet odd as it may seem on the surface, there is another group of people within the church who are intent on reform of a very different nature, and they recently gathered in Jersey City to participate in a Mass that once united Catholics across the globe. Traditionalists, as they call themselves, are seeking not less but more orthodoxy in issues of morality and adherence to church doctrine, and are passionate about a liturgy that all but disappeared after the Second Vatican Council. "The old Latin Mass" said Judith Markenstein, whose husband is a deacon at Holy Rosary Parish here, "gives you a mystical sense of the greatness of God and the smallness of us." The Tridentine Mass fell by the wayside in the 1960's when the Vatican updated the liturgy - abandoning Latin in favor of the vernacular, encouraging more lay involvement on the altar and turning the priest around to face the congregation. In 1984 Pope John Paul II allowed the Tridentine Mass to be celebrated, but only under strict conditions. Then in 1988 he issued Ecclesia Dei, which allowed the old rite as long as local bishops gave their permission. Since then, Tridentine Masses have been increasing steadily, if not flourishing. According to the Coalition in Support of Ecclesia Dei, an Illinois-based organization that provides help to parishes interested in starting up a Tridentine Mass, 150 traditional Masses are celebrated each Sunday in the United States and dozens more once or twice a month, up from 60 a week and 40 a month in 1991. As recently as a week ago, a spokeswoman for the coalition said, 117 of the 201 Catholic dioceses in the United States offered a traditional Latin Mass. One week ago, the Newark Archdiocese became No. 118. The first Tridentine Mass at Holy Rosary Parish in more than 30 years attracted about 100 people from all over North Jersey. What drew them, many said, was the old rite's sense of transcendence and mystery, contemplative silence mixed with the unison voices of Gregorian chant, the pungent smell of incense and the sprinkling of holy water. For Ron Colombo, a Hoboken resident, May 19 was a long time coming. Since moving from New York City in 1999, he and his wife, Kim, had traveled 40 minutes each way on Sundays to attend a Tridentine Mass, either back to Manhattan or to Pequannock. When Mr. Colombo heard last summer that the Rev. Kenneth Baker was mulling over the possibility of bringing Latin back to Holy Rosary, he helped the church's pastor, Msgr. Joseph Chiang, to circulate a petition, which eventually made its way to the desk of Archbishop John J. Myers of Newark, whose jurisdiction includes Jersey City. Nine months later, with the archbishop's permission in hand, new vestments hanging in the sacristy and Latin-English missals, purchased in part with money donated by the Colombos, his legwork came to fruition. The 30-year-old Mr. Colombo grew up in Queens, a "typical American Catholic," he said. He attended catechism classes, where he learned to "color, share and be nice to people," but little about Catholic dogma, and dutifully attended the post-Vatican II Mass. In 1997, as a law student at New York University, he stumbled by chance upon a Tridentine Mass. "I could not believe this was my religion," he said. "For all practical purposes, it wasn't." Crediting the old rite with making him a "true Catholic," he possesses something like the zeal of a convert, pressing to recapture "traditional Catholic culture." Being a traditionalist, he said, "is not just Mass. It's a mind-set. It's orthodoxy plus culture, an entire milieu of Catholic living." That milieu includes shunning meat on Fridays even though the church prescribes abstinence only during Lent, praying the rosary and saying grace before every meal. Robert Phillips, a professor of philosophy at the University of Connecticut at Hartford, said that traditionalists feel that as Catholic liturgy has gone downhill, so have the moral standards of American Catholics, both laity and clergy. "True devotees of the Old Mass are super-orthodox," said Professor Phillips, who places himself in the traditionalist camp, but does not advocate a full-fledged restoration of the Tridentine Rite. Traditionalists "go against many aspects of American Catholicism," he said. As Kevin Flynn, the 40-year-old master of ceremonies at Holy Rosary's first Mass, put it, "I hope an attachment to the Old Mass also means an attachment to a traditional interpretation of Catholicism. Mass should be the center of your life." Mr. Flynn, like Mr. Colombo, is uncomfortable with the dilution of the solemnity of the Mass over the past 30 years or so, and feels that it has been overshadowed by debates on church positions like abortion and contraception, which he does not believe are open for discussion. In the newer Mass, Mr. Flynn and others said, the crucial sense of the sacred, the idea that something central to the faith takes place on the altar, has given way to a more casual approach. The priest facing the congregation "encourages improvisation," said Professor Phillips, relating an anecdote about a priest who interrupted a Mass to inform the congregation that it was his birthday. The New Mass, he said, encourages such ad-libbing because it is celebrated in English, and also because the priest is "looking at the people, and wants to tell them something." But others find fault with blaming the English-language Mass for moral and liturgical laxity. While the Rev. Neil J. Roy, a theology professor at the Catholic University of America in Washington, acknowledged that improvisation happened more frequently today, he would like to see more reverence in the newer rite, rather than a return to the old one. Since for most Catholics, Sunday Mass is the first, and often the most constant, component of their faith, traditionalists see the old rite as a first step on the road to a deeper understanding of Catholicism and stricter adherence to its tenets. "If you can get people into church, and say this is what liturgy is supposed to be, this is about worshipping God, and then we can get them into moral law, abortion, homosexuality, contraception," said Mr. Phillips. Mr. Colombo agreed. Asking rhetorically how many Catholics use birth control, he said, " I'd like to see those same numbers at a traditional Latin Mass. If we return to the traditional Latin Mass, you are going to have a change in people." |
Thanks for posting this, by the way. What seems to be needed is some basic framework put in writing by the bishops affirming that some standards of reverence, solemnity, and dignity be restored to the celebration of Mass. I have seen liturgies which come across as sort of a mix of a PTA meeting and a consciousness-raising rally. Too giddy. Too Protestant in a folksy sort of way. What seems to be happening is that the informal and vulgar elements of secular American mass culture are creeping in. Someone once wrote an article on post-Vatican II liturgical music entitled "Guitar Theology." Can't recall the author, but it hit a few nails on the head. Mass is not a townhall meeting. It's not an encounter group. It's not a political rally. It's not a folk concert. And it's not a public opinion comedy talkshow hosted by the "presider" to air his opinions on everything under the sun. There is a great need for clarification on the sacramental nature of the Mass. The current scandals didn't happen in a vacuum. They took place in a context already marked by the "dilution of the solemnity of the Mass." This isn't a coincidence. When Mass is celebrated with a lack of seriousness and solemnity, it's more likely there will be a lack of seriousness and solemnity in some vocations and in the handling of the teachings of the Church.
Exactly. The sermon, all too frequently the catalog of the priest's opinions, is the least important part of the Mass. Where it becomes a talkshow monologue drawn in style directly from American television it becomes demeaning and demented. The Mass is actually not primarily discursive. We are there to worship and commune with God (not the priest's fuzzy personality and opinions).
What seems to have happened was that the liturgical convulsions following the council came in at the same time as secular American society was experiencing the volcanic eruptions of the counter-culture. Bad taste, vulgarity, a certain giddy and fuzzy quality to communal gatherings, and silliness in general began creeping in. As "encounter group" psychology spread through the clergy a ridiculous subjectivism followed. The Church in America, in many places, became hostage to some of the worst and most annoying elements within the Catholic community - liberal flakes.
We are seeing the deep damage now.
Abortion is murder. Premarital sex is a sin and wrong. Sexual perversions, which, by defnition includes homosexuality, are wrong. God forgives people who repent of their sins, not people who rationalize them.
Pope John XXXII was an old fool. A nice man, but an old fool. The evils wrought by Vatican II are sowing their seeds today in the Catholic Church and its fellow Christian faiths. Ecumenicalism is fine, as long it doesn't include tolerance of sins and abominations.
I wish the Catholic Church a speedy return to the Tridentine Mass, unbending standards of right and wrong, a faith centered on God instead of man, and the religious recovery which will accompany it.
I wish a simlar recovery to its sister Christian faiths, mired in the same morass of moral relativism.
What language is the rest of the service in? I associate the Maronite rite with Lebanon, but maybe that's only because of Danny Thomas.
I'm wondering if the Aramaic words of Consecration represent an unbroken tradition . . . .
Remembering "the Long Hot Summer"
How the Church and American society have changed since 1968.
By James Hitchcock
(excerpt):
Modernity enthroned
In Church and secular society the Sixties also spawned a "lost generation" —people who were young at the time, who imbibed the spirit of the age as naturally as they breathed, who grew into adulthood merely assuming that the outlook of the Sixties reflected reality. It was a phenomenon which made the Democratic Party the permanent stronghold of Sixties beliefs and produced a generation of Catholic priests and religious, now in their 50s, whose formative years were spent amidst total theological and spiritual confusion and in the belief that renewal meant the repudiation of as much of the Catholic past as possible. Although many religious of that generation believe they were liberated by post-conciliar events, in reality most were merely passive victims of a cultural upheaval which they scarcely even began to understand. Had the culture remained stable, most of those who are now bitter towards their religious past would have continued to be happy and productive in their vocations.
Thus such counter-revolution as exists, both in the Church and in the world, tends to be the work of younger people, too young to have been deeply affected by the Sixties. These young people, as they grew up, could readily see the destructive legacy of the previous decades. In the Church, then, there is a rising generation of orthodox priests in their 20s and 30s.
Among the many dramatic events of the year 1968, the death of America's most liberal prelate. Archbishop Paul J. Hallinan of Atlanta, was not much noticed. But following his death his young auxiliary bishop, Joseph L. Bernardin, was made general secretary of the newly reorganized National Conference of Catholic Bishops/United States Catholic Conference, and under his guidance that body was shaped to make it cautiously receptive to Sixties ideas. Ever since that time, the NCCB/USCC has defined the dominant spirit of American Catholicism in ways which even the most intrepid bishops seem unable to resist.
* The full implications of the spirit of the Sixties were not understood even by many of its proponents, for the simple reason that it cut so deep and spread so wide. It was nothing less than a global attack on the idea of truth itself, on the very possibility of any understanding of reality which might lead to stable social relationships. It was a visceral, compulsive reaction against anything or anyone making claims to such truth. *
Ultimately this has been merely the final and inevitable working out of the spirit of modernity itself, because the modern spirit has for three centuries defined itself precisely as the autonomous but oppressed self systematically struggling to liberate itself from outside constraint. Thus all authoritative claims must be rejected, not on their merits but simply because they are authoritative. As modernity understands it, the self will be truly free, and truly a self, only when all vestiges of external "infringement" have been eliminated. This logic reached its inevitable climax in the Sixties and was only half-coherently expressed in the counter-culture. Although various ideological reasons were given for the violent upheavals of the Sixties, finally acts of destruction were simply self-validating.
...In the Church also it is now the visible agenda of groups such as feminist nuns who casually speak of "christofascism" and identify themselves with Eve in her defiance of God's command not to eat the forbidden fruit. There is a concerted movement to grant a privileged position in the Church to every kind of sexual deviation, even as traditional forms of worship are abandoned and the liturgy stripped of all traces of transcendence.
Both in Church and society such efforts proceed according to a kind of irrational compulsion, and will never cease while anything sacred is still left standing, so long as the revolutionaries encounter no effective resistance...
James Hitchcock is a founder of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, and a history professor at St. Louis University. © The Catholic World Report, P.O. Box 591300, San Francisco, CA 94159-1300, 800-651-1531.
The Catholic World Report, July 1998, 44-51.
"I've got a million of 'em!"
Well,Mr. Potatohead,what rock did you crawl out from under?You are so,so "retrograde".
I learned directly from the priest,in the middle of the Eucharistic Prayer just two weeks ago,that "commune" came from the root word "communio" from whence we also get "communion" and "community".
My immediate reaction was a vision of me standing up,yelling "and also communism,you dolt",then taking a huge bite out of my pew neighbor's uncovered arm and leaving the "assembly" to worship each other. But I am such a coward,I just sat and fumed.
The Hidden Hand Behind Bad Catholic Music
By J.A. Tucker
(excerpt):
Musical Gnosticism
...But why should the liturgy team go along with this program? The average parish musical team is made up of nonprofessionals. Its poorly paid members are untrained in music history; they have no particular craving for chant or polyphony, which often seems quite remote to them. Most musicians in average Catholic parishes would have no idea how to plug into the rite an extended musical setting from, say, the high Renaissance, even if they had the desire to do so.
The OCP (Oregon Catholic Press) understands this point better than most publishers. In an interview, Michael Prendergast, editor of Today's Liturgy, pointed again and again to the limited resources of typical parishes. The OCP sees serving such needs as a core part of its publishing strategy; its materials keep reminding us that we don't need to know Church music to get involved.
Lack of familiarity with the Church's musical tradition would not be a grave problem if there were a staple of standard hymns and Mass settings to fall back on. But it has been at least 30 years since such a setting was available in most parishes. The average parish musician wants to use his talents to serve the parish in whatever way possible, but he's at a complete loss as to how to do it without outside guidance. The OCP fills that vacuum.
Under its tutelage, you can aspire to be a real liturgical expert, which means you have attended a few workshops run by OCP-connected guitarists and songwriters (who explain that your job as a musician is to whip people into a musical frenzy: loud microphones, drum tracks, over-the-top enthusiasm when announcing the latest hymn). These "experts" love the OCP's material because it allows them to keep up the pretense that they have some special knowledge about what hymns should be used for what occasions and how the Mass ought to proceed.
Real Catholic musicians who have worked with the OCP material tell horror stories of incredible liturgical malpractice. The music arrangements are often muddled and busy, making it all but impossible for regular parishioners to sing. This is especially true of arrangements for traditional songs, where popular chords give old hymns a gauzy cast that reminds you of the 1970s group Chicago.
The liturgical planning guides are a ghastly embarrassment. Two years ago, for example, the liturgical planner recommended "Seek Ye First" for the first Sunday in Lent ("Al-le-lu-, Al-le-lu-yah"). In numerous slots during the liturgy, OCP offers no alternative to debuting its new tunes. When traditional hymns are offered, they're often drawn from the Protestant tradition, or else the words are changed in odd ways (see, for example, its strange version of "Ubi Caritas"). The liturgical instructions are equally pathetic. On July 8 this year, the liturgical columnist passes on this profound summary of the gospel of the day: "Live and let live."
What You Can Do Right Now
The truth is that no one is happy with the state of Catholic liturgical music-least of all musicians-and the OCP is a big part of the problem. So, what can you do? Step 1 is to get rid of the liturgical planning guides and use an old Scripture index to select good hymns that have stood the test of time (if you absolutely must continue to use the OCP's materials). Step 2 is to rein in the liturgical managers and explain to them that the Eucharist, and not music, is the reason people show up to Mass Sunday after Sunday. Step 3 is to get rid of the OCP hymnals and replace them with Adoremus or Collegeville or something from GIA (no, none of these is perfect, but they are all an oasis by comparison).
Finally, reconsider those innocuous little missalettes. These harmless-looking booklets may be the source of the trouble. Parishes can unsubscribe-accept no OCP handouts or volume discounts. There are plenty of passable missalettes and hymnals out there, and all the choral music you'll ever need is now public domain and easily downloadable for free (www.cpdl.org).
In his book, The Spirit of the Liturgy (Ignatius Press, 2000), Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger states clearly that popular music does not belong at Mass. Indeed, it's part of "a cult of the banal," and "rock" plainly stands "in opposition to Christian worship."
This is very strong language from the cardinal. And yet we know that many liturgy teams in American parishes will continue to do what they've been doing for decades-systematically reconstructing the liturgy to accommodate pop aesthetic sensibilities. The liturgy is treated not as something sublimely different but as a well-organized social hour revolving around religious themes.
It's up to you to decide the future course of your parish's liturgy: reverent worship or hootenanny. Despite what the OCP might tell you, you can't have both.
J.A. Tucker is the choral director of a schola cantorum and writes frequently for CRISIS.
Wonderful post -- I'll have to get that book!
I doubt any right minded Catholic who regularly attends an Indult Latin Mass believes that. But I think the point is that the traditional Mass, in most cases, is more successful in helping the faithful cultivate holiness and a fruitful spiritual life. A good way to see this is through vocations to the priesthood. Is it any accident that it was only during the the late 1960s that priestly vocations began to decline? Furthermore, is it only a coincidence that a society like the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter (an order founded in 1988, with the blessing of the Holy Father, dedicated to celebrating and promoting the Tridentine Mass) has overcrowded seminaries plus long waiting lists of aspiring seminarians? I doubt it.
Anyway, one should not be so hostile to the traditional Mass, especially if you've never experienced it. If any open minded Catholic gives the Tridentine rite a fair chance, say 5 or 6 Sundays in a row- one may become very much like me- a 23 year old Catholic who can't understand why something so beautiful and poetic was replaced with something so unfortunately impoverished.
I grew up on the Tridentine Mass; I find it, like Scotch, to be a wonderful thing, on occasion. I suppose it just depends on how one views the Celebration of the Eucharist. I support anyone being able to attend a Tridentine Mass, if they so choose. The problem is, not every city is going to have a critical mass to justify it.
As to the vocations to the FSSP, it's relative. There's one or two FSSP seminaries in the country versus some 50 Novus Ordo seminaries. I'm just wondering where these guys are going to find work. There aren't that many strictly FSSP parishes; I know of none in Dallas or Fort Worth. Even in a diocese like Lincoln, there's only one. I hope these men are learning the Novus Ordo as well.
That might be the case now. In another ten or fifteen years, when the many young children that are being brought up in the Tridentine rite today are grown with families of their own, and as the traditional Mass becomes better known, it will start to change.
As to the vocations to the FSSP, it's relative. There's one or two FSSP seminaries in the country versus some 50 Novus Ordo seminaries.
I don't think this is really a fair comparison. The FSSP is extrmemely young still- and I doubt if any of those 50 seminaries you speak of are overflowing the way the FSSP's seminary is. This is niether here nor there anyway, because my point is simply that the Tridentine Mass is very adpet at fostering vocations.
There aren't that many strictly FSSP parishes; I know of none in Dallas or Fort Worth.
Do you live in Dallas? Here is the info. for the FSSP in Dallas: Mater Dei Community, Fr. Joseph Valentine, FSSP Chaplain, 6228 Winton St. Dallas, TX 75214 tel (214) 887-8696 fax (214) 887-8717 Chapel of Carmelite Sisters 600 S. Flowers Ave. Dallas, Texas (Loop 12 to Jefferson East) Sunday 9:30 a.m.; 11:30 a.m. St. Thomas Aquinas Church 6306 Kenwood Ave. Dallas, Texas Monday-Friday 6:30 a.m. Saturday 8:00 a.m.
I'm just wondering where these guys are going to find work
From what I've understood, the supply of FSSP priests still has not caught up with the demand as of yet- there are more Bishops wanting to invite them into their diocese than there are FSSP priests to go around. I doubt that anytime soon we'll see FSSP priests being shipped off to say Novus Ordo Masses because there's no need for them. This movement is still very young, and I think its impact on the Church will grow for some time to come.
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