OUR LADY OF FATIMA
CATHOLIC CHURCH
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OUR LADY OF FATIMA CATHOLIC CHURCH |
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May 15, 2005
I have always wondered why there is so much bitterness and negativity in the Traditional Movement and have concluded that much of it is rooted in the spirit of protest that goes with it. Like its elder namesake "Protestantism", Traditional Catholicism is rooted in resistance. Resistance often requires some form of warfare; it implies, therefore, combat. Who, then, is the enemy ?
It is apparent from the liturgical meditation that we receive each year on the First Sunday in Lent that our enemy is three-fold: the world, the flesh and the devil. However, the order in which the triple concupiscence is usually stated is not correct according to the account given for that Sunday. St Matthew begins with Jesus’ hunger and the tempter suggests that Our Lord should change the stones into bread. Thus, our first enemy is our very self, next the world, and finally, according to St .Matthew’s account the devil himself. Note, then, that according to Scripture, we are, first and foremost our own worst enemy.
Nowhere is this more apparent than in Traditional Catholic chapels. By and large we have come together to worship because of some deep-seated resistance to the clown Masses and the bongo drums. The churches where this "liturgy" is perpetrated we term Novus Ordo (The Latin for "New Order" from the term "New Order of the Mass" which Pope Paul VI issued in 1969). Some people incorrectly employ the phrase: "Novus Ordo" in connection with the word: "Church" and thus the term: "Novus Ordo Church" is heard.
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Traditional Catholics, are those Catholics who refuse the reforms that were issued in the wake of the Second Vatican Council, and quite rightly see the fruits of the reform to be the disaster that they have become. Some people resist the reforms based on pure emotion – they simply do not like the reforms and that is it. When asked to define the reasons for their opposition, they are singularly unable to respond. About a decade or so ago, there was a phrase bandied about in Britain: "It’s the Mass that matters" which was the maxim of the English recusant clergy that secretly entered England (risking their lives) from the continent to bring the Sacraments to those Catholics that refused to accept the Reformation of the Church in England in the Sixteenth Century under Henry VIII and his successors. I am afraid that I do not share this jingoistic approach to Tradition. Bishop Richard Williamson of the Society of St. Pius X (and my former seminary rector) was recently interviewed for the Remnant Newspaper and had this to say in part:
What Traditionalism is all about, in my opinion, is not the language of the Mass, nor even the ceremonies of the Mass, but the Faith itself. The Tridentine Mass is to be retained, not because of its great antiquity, nor because of the nostalgia that some people feel as they remember their youth, but because it is the adequate expression of our believing. |
The Latin phrase: Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi expresses better what I mean. It means the "law (or way) of praying is the "law (or way) of believing; how we pray determines how we believe. In other words, the Traditional Mass expresses through the language of the prayers (i.e. what the prayers mean and say) – the Faith that we have as Catholics, namely: man has sinned, Christ has paid the price, through the re-presentation to the Father of the Sacrifice of the Son, God’s justice is appeased, we are forgiven and strengthened through grace to resist evil and do good. The prayers of the Traditional Mass clearly express these realities. The prayers of the New Order of Mass of Paul VI do not clearly state these realities but emphasize the "meal" aspect of the Mass as though a "feeding of the 5000" event were taking place, where bodies are nourished with "bread of life" and "spiritual drink" and souls are not washed clean from sin.
As Paul VI made plans for the new rite of Mass in the late 1960s a number of theologians openly warned him that the new liturgy would weaken the faith of Catholics since it did not clearly espouse Catholic theology (the Mass is a sacrifice for sin), opting for a protestant notion (the Mass is the Lord’s Supper, a memorial of what Christ did, rather than the very event of the Cross made present here and now and re-offered to God as atonement for our sins). With the benefit of the last 40 odd years of Church history, truly the devastation is everywhere.
Bitterness and resentment are almost always a human reaction when something that is treasured is wrenched from us. Those who actually experienced the replacement of the Tridentine Mass with "fabricated liturgy" and "a banal on-the-spot product" as the former Cardinal Ratzinger called it (meaning Paul VI’s New Mass) have been, for the most part emotionally scarred by the upheavals of those days. In the intervening years, some of the clergy, incorrectly concluding that we have been without a Pope since 1958, (since Vatican I infallibly decreed we would always have a Pope until the end of time), have, in a sense, inbred this hatred and bitterness, causing some to suggest, so I heard, that I am heading to the "Novus Ordo Church" (there it is, that dreadful expression again !).
How many Catholic Churches are there ? Last time I recited the Nicene Creed (the Creed you hear at Mass on Sundays) there was "One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church". Yes, "one" Church. Presumably, then, the recently elected Benedict XVI, (since there will always be an unbroken succession until the end of time), is the head of that Church. In that same interview Bishop Williamson again:
"I think that’s the best answer now, to watch and pray. We hope—charity hopes all things—we hope, because he must be receiving much more grace as Pope. It is God’s Church. We do believe Benedict is Pope. Therefore, logically, either God has abandoned His Church, which is impossible, or God must be giving Pope Benedict XVI all the graces he needs to direct the Church for the good of souls." (My emphasis)
Returning to the original theme: bitterness and negativity. Since our adherence to Tradition is often dictated by a rejection of the reforms of Vatican II, the danger is, in passing judgment on those reforms, that we allow our intellect to become clouded, leading us first of all to deny defined dogmas (heresy): viz. there will always be a Pope, and secondly to the rejection of a true Pope (which is schism). Pope Pius XII in his encyclical on the Mystical Body of the Church in 1943 stated the following:
"In the Church they alone are to be counted as members who have received the baptism of regeneration and profess the true faith, who moreover, have not had the misfortune to separate themselves from the assembly of the Body, or been excommunicated by the legitimate authority by reason of very grave faults."
Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, 1943, Pontifical Teachings 1022
Union with the Papacy is strictly necessary for salvation and especially if people want to call themselves Catholic as Pope Pius IX wrote:
"In fact, it is contrary to the divine constitution of the Church as it is perpetual and constant tradition for anyone to attempt to prove the catholicity of his faith and truly call himself a Catholic when he fails in obedience to the Apostolic See. For it is necessary for all the other churches, that is, for all the faithful of the entire world, to be in agreement with this See by reason of its sovereign primacy, and he who abandons the Chair of Peter on which the Church is founded, is falsely persuaded that he is in the Church, since he is already a sinner and a schismatic who raises up a chair against the one Chair of Peter, from which flow to all others the sacred rights of communion.
"All these declarations are so emphatic that we must conclude from them that a man who has been declared schismatic by the Roman Pontiff must cease absolutely to claim the name of Catholic so long as he fails to recognize and does not expressly revere that Pontiff’s power in its fullness."
Encyclical Quartus supra, January 6, 1873 Pope Pius IX
Papal Teachings – The Church, St Paul Editions, 1962 p. 226
Surely, though, we are resisting the Pope – for example we pray the Tridentine Mass and not the New Mass, how can this be so ? The Pope can be wrong. He can make a mistake. If it were ever shown to be so, we would be right to politely decline to follow a mistake. A group of Dutch theologians wrote as follows:
"Every Catholic, when all is said and done, stands alone before his Creator and has to render an account to Him of his deeds. But he also respects every representative of God, recognizing that it is God Himself who is speaking through the human person. Unless he is clearly aware that the Ecclesiastical Authorities are acting unlawfully (a thing which rarely occurs) he is obliged to accept their authority as coming direct from God."
The Triptych of the Kingdom - A Handbook of the
Catholic Faith
Doornik / Jelsma / Van de Lisdonk, London, 1954, p 131
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Last year the current Pope, in a preface for a book on the liturgy, wrote the following concerning the Pope’s ability to tinker with the liturgy:
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Conclusion: We must not let our human weaknesses blind us to the fact that God is in charge of his Church and that there is only one Catholic Church, with one visible head, for whom it is our duty to pray. We should also remember that, unlike Protestants, we do not believe in the principle of private interpretation; that we accept our religion as proposed to us by Holy Mother Church, and disagree only when what has been taught is contradicted by the Magisterium (or teaching authority) of the Church.
There was once a Mystic who, like many Traditionalists, was a prey to melancholy, and had a very unhealthy view of how God’s Providence would work itself out. God spoke to her, broke in on her sadness and revealed, in the wonderful words of Our Divine Savior to the 14th Century English mystic, Mother Julian of Norwich, that He would work all things to their own end and that in the end all would be well !:
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Revelations of Divine Love |
  
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