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Yo, Magisterium:

Regarding Portuguese, yeah, me too: fifty years or so ago my mom made an honest effort, but outside of some weird phonetic vowel chant like: "tuno, fino, nata," with no memorable success, I'm afraid to say.

Speaking of "Mom" -- and more particularly "The Catechism According to Mom": while dealing over the years with many self-described "True Blue Remnant Traditional Catholics," etc. her advice often comes to mind:

"Son, beware those Catholics 'holier than the Pope!'"

See ya,

Dennis

Yo, Magisterium:

If anybody has been keeping up the SSPX they'll know that the internet is swamped with references as to how Bishop Rifan "con-celebrated the new mass," etc.

Frankly I don't care if he has.

For me and I'm sure others what really counts is indeed his loyalty to Rome.

A number of us were privileged to meet and talk with him in a common language, Spanish, back in 1996 when he was on his way back to Brazil.

A very impressive and matter of fact individual.

In so far as this particular thread goes, it so happens to be one of the comparative few in English that has anything to say about him at all in recent times.

A random search with YAHO0 or any other search engine I suspect will confirm this.

While he still (I guess!) comes here to America now and again, my growing impression these last two years is that many so-called "Traditionalists" are cool towards him.

Yet, for all that, he is still very active in Church affairs (as this website indicates) both in his native Brazil and abroad.

Left-wing elements of the portuguese-language Brazilian press hate him, and from their perspective, with good reason.

Thnaks for the input!

Dennis

Yo, Cinnamon!

Sorry, right now I can't, 'cause I just dropped dead from a heart attack!

Like wow!

Thanks for getting in touch, big time..

Dennis

God point, Rogator!

You screw it up (the TLM) by adapting improvised rubrics of your own devising.

The more flamboyant and theatrical the better.

As here,in the case we'e described above, you make-up your very own rubrics.

Given what Saint Pius X himself said about such things, it's really whimsical to see how a Society that uses his name can -- in places like where I'm located -- do it all, and answer to no one as a result.

The biggest whine! whine! whine! for ME, at any rate, is that at some point in the preceedings, yes!

A valid consecration DOES take place!

And as for the priests -- certainly both the Bread and the Wine are "validly" consecrated as they themselves are unodubtedly validly ordained.

Yet, by participating in these "Fathers Gilbert and Sullivan DO the TLM" routines, just WHAT kind of priests are they?

Anybody who wants to read a REAL "whine" on the priests themselves, need only check out Pope St. Pius X's own point of view in "The Soul of the Apostolate," described by the good pope himself as "my favorite bedside book."

And be prepared: "Four to five SOLID pages of whine! whine! whine!" And all about such kinds of priests.

Dennis a.ka. "The whine!" (heh, heh!)

It was just this kind of uninspiring Peter-pansy liturgical spectacle, masquerading as "The Tridentine Latin Mass of All Time, Local Homeboy Gilbert and Sullivan Variation Number 973" that helped convince me, personally, to say: "Forget it!

The fact that all this was done by so-called "Society of St. Pius X" Priests and one forlorn diocesan hanger-on changed nothing, at least not for me.

At the end of a 2-hour meeting between five of us members of the local "palace guard" -- 100% male of course -- women are treated with casual contempt -- and Fr. Francis Schmidberger, who in terms of sheer power, out ranks any of the bishops of the Society, I asked him point blank as to what exactly was the "Big Plan."

"Father, the most recent stats (2002) show clearly that here in America, the Society of St. Pius X can barely claim 20% of the total Traditional Latin Mass sites in the country. That being said, how can the Society claim to Rome that it represents all priests wanting the freedom to offer it here in OUR country?"

I'll say this, he was fast on his feet, and in recovering from shock, too. He simply retorted:

"The Society does NOT need Rome's permission to say the true Mass," was his answer. (And on THAT happy note, "we adjourned!")

I guess what I'm trying to say here is that however much we may legitemately pine for stability and continuity in Sunday worship, any such an organization whose actual behavior seems to reflect an anarchistic spirit, as much in liturgy as in "attitude," just might not be ready, willing, nor able to supply us what we really want, after all.

But then again, everyone is entitled to view reality in her or his own way, or so we've often been told!

Yet, to me, as my own knee-jerk opinion, the best thing the Vatican can do right now is to take its time and go slow.

Dennis

Wow!

Or "Guau!" as we say the same sound in Spanish: to think that there is at least one other of "us" to whom Allen Drury was (or better is) a living memory.

But!

Speaking of CRS -- was the character saying "Opposed suh, unalterably opposed" one of the lucky ones to wind up at the business end of a Soviet KGB (or was a GRU?) firing squad after "The Big Takeover," or did he have the bad luck to windup up in the Funny Farm as an anti-Soviet 1096?

Thanks!

Dennis

Yo, Larry!

Thanks a bunch for that info. Going over 30 was one of the worst things I've ever done, CRS "Can't Remember Stuff" gets ahold of you and won't let go.

Such being the case, if THAT is a "patten," then what do we call the small gold plate in the priest's hands he uses to offer the host?

Thanks for the input,

Dennis

Livius, my friend!

Thanks for reminding me of something I've tried to block in my mind, not always successfully, especially since I've gradually come to realize that maybe as many as 30% to 40% of the youngest members often show signs of a chemical dependency, to put it politely!

Thus, what you say is Only too true...

Dennis

As a fairly typical so-called "Coninuity Catholic" -- sort of like saying "Come weal, or come woe, our status is in most cases, at least, most likely kinda quo" -- I've personally never had any real opinion one way or the other.

Recently, however, this begin to change when I was visiting relatives in a small country parish located deep in the South Texas brush, cattle, goat, and cactus country, not far from where John Wayne made "The Alamo."

The lady of the house pointed out that for many girls in such small out of the way places, training to become an altar server is the closest girls (as well as boys) can ever get to a Catholic Religious Education.

In this case, at least, the results were pretty impressive.

At Communion time every altar server, boy or girl, was ready with her (or his) long-handled wooden deal with a round thing at the end. I was impressed, as I hadn't seen them used in years, outside traditional Latin Masses.

"So, what say? Yea or Nay? Do we keep on with altar girls in the future? Or do we throw the baby out with the bath water?"

Thanks!

Dennis

Yo, Smokin' Joe, thank you a whole bunch,

Especially as you say Alibris.com usually has a picture.

Semper Fi!

Dennis

Howdy, Straight Vermonter!

Say, somebody told me almost a year ago that when we really want to make a difference in this kind of situation write a letter detailing all the facts and figures, and send it registered mail, return receipt requested, to your local bishop.

After pondering all this leisurely for 8 months of so, I decided "O.K, let's rock: but we'll sent all four pages (or however many) to the ARCHbishop (heh! heh!). So, we did.

Things went along their merry way, until all of a sudden, pow!

A certain individual started running around with a curiously wan expression and a "changed attitude," perhaps because he was the individual who, as we had stated matter-of-factly, "Had Lost Control."

Moreover, we painted him as someone in need of fraternal correction inasmuch as his alleged "loss of control" could potentially have involved "this particular diocese being sued into financial oblivion," and backing THAT admittedly sensational statement with some basic intel.

So, I guess that other fellow was right, and doing this registered letter + return receipt requested routine CAN (at least sometimes!) be of help.

Thanks for the input,

Dennis

Yo, onedoug!

Hey, think about what Lech is saying: fear makes us do all kinds of crazy things.

Lech had it big time, many times.

Dennis

Thanks a bunch, Daffy!
Dennis

Yo, Tax-chick!

Good advice, but because of my dual handicap of being BOTH "Motivationally Impaired" and "Intellectually Challenged," I settled for a brisk hike, at a moderate altitude of 3,800 feet or so.

By the way, if you REALLY want us to believe you're a bonafide pistol-packing member of the IRS' Criminal Intelligence Division, better yet, a CID officer with a solid background in Narcotics and Vice, working out of some office like the one in Buffalo, New York, why not prove it by getting our neighbor Dangus and me his "missing cite," which he can't find for himself, nor I for myself?

Man!

With all the clout you CID officers have, it shouldn't be too big a challenge.

What say?

See you guys...

Dennis

PS I picked Buffalo, because in the early Spring of 1983 at least, they were a very aggressive bunch of-getters.

Yo, dangus!

Point well taken, thanks!

You were 100% right in what you said, inasmuch as in normal English usage, setting original sources aside by flanking the excerps with quotation marks [ " ]before the beginning, and another set of [ " ] at the end -- plus the cites and page numbers -- would have done the trick, as least back in the Stone Age, so far as enabling a reader to determine for herself (or himself) just WHICH is the cited material and WHICH is the submitter's personal knee-jerk opinion.

Then again, maybe I'm just lucky 'cause I learned the fundamentals by going to a more or less podunk public high school over 40 years ago.

"Back when we were still using clay tablets and a stylus.."

Thanks for the input, especially for what you said about all this having been already taken care of, since in the Diocese of El Paso, reality is whatever the individual priest makes it, and what he makes it is up to him.

As Bishop Ochoa told us genially one afternoon during the pm Mass, when he'd just come back from that particular meeting:

"Some of these changes I can live with, with others well, we'll just have to see."

Another priest told us it would be like 3 to 5 years or who knows (or cares) before all this is "supposed" to be implemented. (Heh! Heh!)

Dennis

In what may have been a desperate attempt to gain their American Catholic colleagues time, both Father Bradley and Kevane stuck this footnote Number 18, willy-nilly on the bottom of this same page:

"18. This disjunction in meaning between MANY and ALL, although valid on the terms of the theological distinction made in the text, is unnecessary on purely philological and historical terms.

"The POLLOI of the original New Testament text means BOTH MANY and ALL interchangeably.

"Taken as an exact equivalent of that Greek word, the Latin MULTI can -- and should -- convey both senses.

"And therefore both equivalents in English, MANY and ALL, are justified."

Sorry folks! If that's the case why do even the bulk of American Catholic Bibles in circulation today still leave the word MANY alone, except for some drivel in a footnote?

Now, here's the text of the ROMAN CATECHISM:

"24. The Appropriateness of the Special Mention of the Passion in This Consecration

"...The next phrase, FOR YOU AND FOR MANY, is taken partly from St. Matthew, partly St Luke (Mt 26:28; Lk 22:20). Guided by the Spirit of God, the Catholic Church has made it a single phrase. It is meant to designate the actual effectiveness of the Passion.

"If we consider its potential efficacy, we would have to say that the Blood of the Savior was shed for ALL MEN.

"But if we look to what it actually achieves in terms of mankind's acceptance of it, we see that it does not extend to the whole, but only to a large part of the human race.

"When, therefore, he said, FOR YOU, he meant those only who were present at the Supper except Judas; or he may also have meant all the disciples whom we had chosen along with the Twelve.

"And when he added FOR MANY, he was including all the other elect from among the Jews and the Genties until the end of time.

"The alternative expression, FOR ALL was properly omitted, because here it is only the fruit of the Passion which is spoken of; and for the elect only does the Passion bear the fruit of salvation."

Something for we rank and file American Catholics to ponder, humm??

Or, is this whole FOR ALL MEN business just another routine example of a lack of even merely academic integrity that we still insist in putting words in the mouth of Jesus Christ, the better to make Him both idologically and politically correct?

Dennis

Yo, Brooklyn Dave!

That's a good point, about not changing much for 20 or 30 years.

Funny thing, though, about our liberal brethern in a certain generic sense and that is while oozing ecumenism from out of every pore they can't stand being told, no matter how tactfully, that those warm fuzzy little monkeys we read about in Kipling's story about Mowgli make them, the liberals, sound familar even if you've never met one.

As I recall the monkeys boasted to Mowgli something more or less like this:

"Anything we ever tell you is the real truth because we all agree with one another that this is so."

And so the problem I have Brookly Dave, is simply this:

"How could those warm, fuzzy little monkeys, so beloved by the rest of their jungle neighbors, have predicted the intellectual level of so much of American Catholic Theology today?"

For me -- it's like "My, oh my! It's ALL such a mystery!"

Dennis