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California bishop responds to lay group (re Tridentine Mass)
Renew America ^ | September 14, 2006 | Matt C. Abbott

Posted on 09/15/2006 8:49:34 AM PDT by NYer

In the ongoing saga in the Diocese of Orange, Calif., Bishop Tod Brown has formally responded to the Catholic lay group Restore the Sacred. The text of the bishop's letter (dated September 6, 2006), which was sent to a member of Restore the Sacred, is as follows:



TOPICS: Activism; Apologetics; Catholic; Current Events; General Discusssion; Ministry/Outreach; Prayer; Religion & Culture; Theology; Worship
KEYWORDS: catholic
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To: cosine

I would be very suprised if they say it in private...in fact shocked wouldn't be strong enough a word.

I honestly think it would be impossible to find one who uses the Novus Ordo.

My comment was just an FYI, that I learned through the conversation I had with an FSSP Seminarian and Diocesan Seminarian from the same parish who were later ordained in the same year.


21 posted on 09/15/2006 9:47:10 AM PDT by Cheverus
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To: NYer

Reading all of these hair-splitting replies amuses me and makes me glad that I escaped the roman catholic denomination many years ago. I find it's much more satisfying to be a generic Christian with only Jesus as my master.


22 posted on 09/15/2006 9:49:56 AM PDT by vincentjay (I'm convinced that Bill Clinton is most-likely to be revealed as the anti-christ.)
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To: NYer
This is not to say that, sometime in the future, there may [omitted?] be an appropriate time when the question can be raised again.

I'm not on either side of this issue. But I did catch the omission of the completion of the implied meaning of this sentence -- a sentence that is really the tossing of a bone.

23 posted on 09/15/2006 9:52:34 AM PDT by the invisib1e hand (I'm ready.)
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To: NYer
In this diocese I have determined that the faithful will stand from the Great Amen until after receiving Holy Communion. This posture reflects our humble gratitude for the great things God has done in creating and redeeming us. We also recognize the eschatological significance of standing as we look forward to the day when Christ will come again and pray that Christ may find us worthy to stand before Him. After the reception of communion, each participant is free to kneel or sit, however they choose.

Not in my Arch-Diocese.

We had some churches in the Arch-D that were built with out kneelers. Your options, stand or sit, kneeling is old-school. Yes, those post-VII bookstores. I know that in some of these parishes kneelers are being put in much to the chagrin of the Cafeteria Catholics who attend.

24 posted on 09/15/2006 9:53:33 AM PDT by Jaded (does it really need a sarcasm tag?)
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To: Kolokotronis; murphE
Seems to me the bishop is on pretty solid ground here, though if memory serves, communion was received kneeling during the Tridentine Mass, was it not?

The Second Vatican Council set about restoring some of the more authentic practices from the early church. While I'm not sure at what point in time kneeling replaced standing in the Latin Church, it firmly embedded itself into the liturgy for 500+ years, and was / is viewed as a sign of reverence and respect. From the perspective of a devout Roman Catholic, Bishop Tod is asking them to be disrespectful.

25 posted on 09/15/2006 9:55:12 AM PDT by NYer ("That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah." Hillel)
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To: gbcdoj; Cheverus

"As far as Nicaea I, this legislation was appropriate for its time but we hardly think that the Church must be bound by every disciplinary canon from the primitive ages."

Personally, I agree with you. As you know, there are canons forbidding us to go to Jewish doctors. My point was that requiring the faithful to receive communion standing up is hardly some looney modernist innovation (though this bishop may be a looney modernist/syncretist). There is ancient practice to back it up.

And C, gbcdoj will tell you that when I want to be snippy, I'm pretty obvious about it.


26 posted on 09/15/2006 9:55:21 AM PDT by Kolokotronis (Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!)
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To: NYer

"From the perspective of a devout Roman Catholic, Bishop Tod is asking them to be disrespectful."

NYer, as you know, I tend to be a bit on the "traditional" side myself! :) But in this case the devout Roman Catholic who believes his/her bishop is telling them to be disrespectful is just plain wrong (I hope!). I don't doubt for a second that kneeling for communion has been around at least 500 years. I'll bet even longer. Its age gives it immense value. But that's the argument to make, not that standing is some modernist, disrespectful innovation.


27 posted on 09/15/2006 10:01:12 AM PDT by Kolokotronis (Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!)
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To: NYer
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has determined that in the United States, Holy Communion is received standing and that the appropriate sign of respect is a bow of the head before the Sacrament. The Diocese of Orange is obliged to observe this norm.

It is interesting that Bishop Brown does not think that he is obliged to observe the following norms:

Only when there is a necessity may extraordinary ministers assist the Priest celebrant [with Communion] in accordance with the norm of law.
(Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments,Redemptionis sacramentum, no. 88)

Moreover, respect must everywhere by shown for the feelings of all those who are attached to the Latin liturgical tradition by a wide and generous application of the directives already issued some time ago by the Apostolic See for the use of the Roman Missal according to the typical edition of 1962.
(Pope John Paul II, Ecclesia Dei)


28 posted on 09/15/2006 10:05:21 AM PDT by Petrosius
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To: Kolokotronis

"Its age gives it immense value."

satan worship was around for a long time before Jesus submitted to incarnation. Does its age "give it immense value?"


29 posted on 09/15/2006 10:06:22 AM PDT by vincentjay (I'm convinced that Bill Clinton is most-likely to be revealed as the anti-christ.)
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To: Jaded
I have seen people kneel on the hard floor. And even in some of the ultra-modern SpaceShip parishes a few communicants will kneel at Communion. Usually one or two. It's no big deal. I didn't notice the priest or Eucharistic minister not figuring out how to give Communion in this situation.

It is certainly NOT a mortal sin (perhaps one of the most ridiculous and outrageous modernist statements of recent times).

Now, people who believe that they have to kneel at Holy Communion would be better off attending the TLM.

There is yet another aspect to this which makes the modernist position here even more absurd. Progressive liberal modernists are great at accomodating their liberal friends who want to dissent on the politics of abortion. And we hear all sorts of pieties about "liberty of conscience" and how Vatican II was all about involving the laity and accomodating their opinions and conscience. Why not "liberty of conscience" on kneeling?

Why does the modernist minimalist bishop here fail to invoke the liberal hosannas and pieties on behalf of the sacred liberty of conscience of the laity? Inquiring minds would like to know... It seems a strange omission, considering no doubt that liberal Catholics who support abortion are receiving Holy Communion while standing at minimalist liturgies in his diocese. And so, if he is willing to accomodate them in their grave liberties of conscience on matters of human life, he ought to be able to accomodate those who exercise conscience merely on one of the musical chairs issues of liturgical discipline.

30 posted on 09/15/2006 10:08:05 AM PDT by HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity
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To: vincentjay

"satan worship was around for a long time before Jesus submitted to incarnation. Does its age "give it immense value?"

No, but I suggest that its persistence means we should pay close attention to it and take it very, very seriously.


31 posted on 09/15/2006 10:08:29 AM PDT by Kolokotronis (Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!)
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To: Petrosius
It is interesting that Bishop Brown does not think that he is obliged to observe the following norms: Only when there is a necessity may extraordinary ministers assist the Priest celebrant [with Communion] in accordance with the norm of law. (Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments,Redemptionis sacramentum, no. 88) Moreover, respect must everywhere by shown for the feelings of all those who are attached to the Latin liturgical tradition by a wide and generous application of the directives already issued some time ago by the Apostolic See for the use of the Roman Missal according to the typical edition of 1962. (Pope John Paul II, Ecclesia Dei) 28 posted on 09/15/2006 1:05:21 PM EDT by Petrosius

As you point out, the statements in the bishops letter are not in accord with the Church's official policy on the Latin Mass. He is in error here.

32 posted on 09/15/2006 10:19:10 AM PDT by HowlinglyMind-BendingAbsurdity
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To: Kolokotronis

"... 'Does its age "give it immense value?'"

"No...."

If age does not give satan worship (or anything else) great value, then it should give nothing great value.

(Don't get me wrong. I'm not a satan worshipper. I picked that as one might choose Hitler to illustrate great evil.)


33 posted on 09/15/2006 10:21:10 AM PDT by vincentjay (I'm convinced that Bill Clinton is most-likely to be revealed as the anti-christ.)
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To: Kolokotronis
I don't doubt for a second that kneeling for communion has been around at least 500 years. I'll bet even longer. Its age gives it immense value. But that's the argument to make, not that standing is some modernist, disrespectful innovation.

Knelling for Communion in the West developed as a result of greater devotion to the Eucharistic presence of our Lord. During the Reformation the Protestants returned to receiving while standing to show there rejection of the Catholic teaching on transubstantiation and to deny a distinction between the ordained clergy and the laity. It is within this historical context that Catholics react against standing for Communion. It is also because it takes place with other changes that would communicate a lessened belief in the Real Presence: Communion in the hand, illegal use of extraordinary ministers of Communion, removal of altar rails and the distinction between the sanctuary and the nave, removal of the tabernacle from the sanctuary (and even from the body of the church itself), etc.

34 posted on 09/15/2006 10:21:41 AM PDT by Petrosius
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To: vincentjay
Reading all of these hair-splitting replies amuses me and makes me glad that I escaped the roman catholic denomination many years ago. I find it's much more satisfying to be a generic Christian with only Jesus as my master.

First, the Roman Catholic Church is not a "denomination." That would be part of the system you are now a part of, Protestantism.

It's amusing that you think that "hair splitting" only goes on in the Catholic Church. I do believe that hair splitting is what has caused so MANY denominations within Protestantism.

Since you are so happy in your generic Christian faith, why don't you go be happy and leave Catholic matters to Catholics to hash out?

35 posted on 09/15/2006 10:25:24 AM PDT by FJ290
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To: Kolokotronis

"This was reaffirmed by Canon 90 of the Council of Trullo which was held in conjunction with the Sixth Ecumenical Council."

The Catholic Church never recognized the Council in Trullo (i.e Quintasext) as ecumenical.


36 posted on 09/15/2006 10:26:14 AM PDT by Miles the Slasher
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To: murphE
Hmmm . . .

. . . whenever I think of "smarmy", I always think of the egregious Rev. Obadiah Slope from Barchester Towers.

Brothers under the skin, sounds like.

37 posted on 09/15/2006 10:27:29 AM PDT by AnAmericanMother ((Ministrix of Ye Chase, TTGC Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment)))
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To: NYer
They and the people of the Diocese generally would likely view permission for the Tridentine Mass so close upon the protests as nothing less than a capitulation to a special interest group. This is not to say that, sometime in the future, there may be an appropriate time when the question can be raised again.

This I find curious. This is a clear example of what I said many times before. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Protests serve no purpose, except to entrench people.

No Bishop anywhere would serve his Church by appearing to cave into protests.

Only by submission to his Authority in the name of Christ, as the Church teaches, could you expect him to approve the Indult for this Parish.

This is why the Indult is by Diocese, because some would erode a Bishops authority in his diocese by suggesting that protests would sway any Diocesan policy.

Staging protests was a pretty counter-productive act
38 posted on 09/15/2006 10:27:57 AM PDT by Dominick ("Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought." - JP II)
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To: Miles the Slasher; gbcdoj

"The Catholic Church never recognized the Council in Trullo (i.e Quintasext) as ecumenical."

True, but as gbcdoj pointed out, the Pope confirmed its holdings save for certain ones having to do with local Western customs.


39 posted on 09/15/2006 10:30:31 AM PDT by Kolokotronis (Christ is Risen, and you, o death, are annihilated!)
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To: Kolokotronis

But this confirmation was by the pope's own authority and is thus not binding upon him.


40 posted on 09/15/2006 10:36:04 AM PDT by Petrosius
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