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You are wrong about the Tridentine Mass. All ancient rites in the West differed in merely minor ways from one another. Prayers like the Kyrie were recited in the catacombs. All Trent did was codify one version and impose unity.

As for what the fight is about, you incorrectly state the problem. The problem is with people like you who think the Pope can do anything he pleases and those like me who know he can't. How do I know? Because Vatican I set limits on him. He cannot oppose tradition--he must protect it and pass it on unchanged. He is the guardian of our heritage. Thomas Aquinas made it clear that even if a pope gave the command, if it would harm the Church we would be obliged to disobey. St. Robert Bellarmine made the same point. Both are doctors of the Church. Your notion of what the Pope can and cannot do is incorract. It is papolatry--pope worship. It is blind obedience-- something no one on earth should expect.

You call me a heretic, but these days the heretics are made cardinals and the real schismatics--Protestants, Orthodox--are in great favor. It is people like you who support the new religion that has been invented. But it is not Catholicism. It has the buildings and uses some of the same words, but they mean different things and it is not the ancient Faith. Look in any church--where is the tabernacle? It is no longer central. No one genuflects--because the belief in His presence is not there. There is a table but no altar. The priest presides, but he no longer offers sacrifice.

You are wrong about the Tridentine Mass. All ancient rites in the West differed in merely minor ways from one another. . . . All Trent did was codify one version and impose unity.

Fine. Let me know where the earliest copy exists or existed, or even simply your source for your contention that the Apostles said the Tridentine.

Prayers like the Kyrie were recited in the catacombs.

LOL. The Tridentine does not have exclusive rights to the Kyrie. It is still said in the Novus Ordo, and in other Rites. So if that is your only way of tracing the Tridentine back, it appears we can equally trace the Novus Ordo all the way back.

Because Vatican I set limits on him.

Very well, please quote from Vatican I what limits it set.

He cannot oppose tradition--he must protect it and pass it on unchanged.

Popes have been changing the liturgy for the last 2000 years. If you consider the Tridentine unchangeable you believe contrary to that tradition. Read the Mediator Dei quotes, above, about the heirarchy's right to adapt the liturgy.

patent +AMDG

"All Trent did was codify one version and impose unity."

You might be interested in knowing that many of these older rites, or at any rate, those that haven't completely disappeared, are being revived.

In Spain, for example, the native rite, known as the "Mozarabic Rite," is being revived. BTW, the name refers to Christians in Arab lands, since Spain was under Islam at that time. However, it is also known as the Visigothic Rite, and was the rite that was used in Spain after the rejection of Arianism in the 6th century. It is closely connected to the Eastern rites.

It was replaced by the so-called "Frankish Rite" in the 11th century, when French clerics came into Spain as Islam was being driven back from the North of Spain.

It continued to be celebrated in some places, and was officially revived in the 15th century for use in the Cathedral in Toledo. Now permission has been granted for it to be used in other parts of Spain, most notably the Cathedral de la Almudena in Madrid. The unfortunate thing is that, while its chant was transcribed, no one is very sure of how to read it, so restoring the Mozarabic rite is not as easy as it might seem.

I have also heard that the Ambrosian rite is being restored in some places in England.

Perhaps this is the future? Or part of it, at any rate...