What Does The Prayer Really Say?
W D T P R S

The Pastor the the infamous breakaway parish St. Joan of Arc in my home town of Minneapolis published this in the parish bulletin. I tip my biretta to the Stella Borealis blog. o{]:¬)

In the following the emphasis is mine as are my comments:

Pastor’s 2 Cents: Fr. Jim DeBruycker:

In Catholic theology, church teaching is often divided between Traditio and Tradita. Traditio is the enduring teachings, the dogma of the Church, the Nicene Creed being the most prominent. It is the great Tradition of eternal truths. Tradita is the lesser accumulated beliefs and customs, i.e., what color cassock can a monsignor wear on Easter. Our salvation does not depend on it, unless of course, you are a monsignor. [Har! Har! Har!]

Arguments arise over what is Traditio and what is purely custom. I would say the closer a custom comes to an eternal truth the deeper and greater the theological agreement becomes. Theological sanctions against abortion, euthanasia and capital punishment deal with first principles of life and rightly come under the heading of Tradition.

Who is ordained is one of those issues which comes right at the intersection of Traditio and tradita. There is evidence that married men and women were ordained priests, if not bishops [underscore that "not], at different times in the Church.[Noooo… the only groups who had any female priestesses were heretical groups. The Catholic Church never had female priesthood.] From about the seventh century on in the Latin Rite, a celibate clergy become more and more the rule. John Paul II saw it and defined it as part of the Traditio. Of course, a lot of people are not happy with this and feel there is argument for what they see as an older tradition. [Big deal. Priestly celibacy in the West and the issue of ordaining women are like apples and giraffes. They ought not be confused or conflated.]

An example of this was in last week’s bulletin. There was an ad for Womenpriests Celebrate the Eucharist. Needless to say, the phone calls and emails have arrived in force. In this case they are correct. The magisteriam [Magisterium] does not recognize their ordination or their celebration of the Eucharist as a sacrament [But it does "recognize" them as scandalous actions that attack the unity of the Church, risk eternal hell, and deserve excommunication as a remedial sanction.]. The way we presented this in the bulletin as if it was no more than a small protest, has been interpreted by some as cavalier. It borders on schism and is not sanctioned by the magisterian [yet another spelling] as a valid sacrament. I know this sounds overtly pedantic and patriarchal [consider the audience, folks, consider the audience] but it would be a lie to pretend it was not portentous. I am sure Dr. Irvin’s presentation “Ancient and Contemporary Models of Womenpriests and Deacons” will be learned and factual [or a tissue of lies and mistakes], but it doesn’t change present [?] Church teaching.

I don’t say often enough how much I love being a priest. In all honesty I often don’t invite others into the priesthood because I feel how exclusionary it is to women [So? Just invite MEN and you won’t have this problem!]. I do not have an answer to the pain and anguished burning when those who want to serve are excluded. [I have a couple.]

The Gospel today sends up the question “What is of vital importance? What is God’s law? What is human tradition?" Some of it will wait to be found out in eternity, until then we must follow the most patriarchal of Apostles, James. [Luther didn’t like him either.]

Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Believe me, this is presented in deepest humility.