This WDTPRS blog was born from a project of helping people to know what the prayers of Holy Mass really say, because the Lord knows we are not getting their true content in the translation presently in use.
The idea of WDTPRS is to help people get into the primary texts of the prayers and therefore come to love their content. The content of the prayers is not just words but The Word made flesh.
So, I was interested in an entry on The Undercroft, in which the writer offers advice to a former Protestant now a Catholic interested in liturgy (like myself). The convert wants to know about the older, "Tridentine" form of Mass and if it would be a good thing to have it back.
The writer advises his convert friend to dig directly into the texts and rubrics of the Mass but… and this was probably VERY good advice, avoid "TradWorld".
By "TradWorld" the author seems to mean what he finds on the internet, rather than breathing, flesh and blood communities in parishes where the old Mass is celebrated.
He makes an oblique comparison of the hard core traditionalist "community" to the Gulag Archipelago, of Solzhenitsyn fame. What occured to me instantly was a lesser read work of Dosteyevsky, Memoirs from the House of the Dead.
Look at this thoughtful post at The Undercroft. The following is edited:
A LITTLE while ago an aquaintance – a former Protestant, someone of far deeper theological learning than me … – began expressing a serious interest in the traditional Liturgy of the Roman Rite (as I guessed he would, sooner or later). His questions were characteristically thoughtful and Christocentric; living in a country with a tiny Catholic population, he had no present opportunity to assist at the traditional Liturgy and few sympathetic souls with whom to discuss it, but he had provided himself with a Missal and a Breviary, for the purpose of investigating the differences between Old and New. Having done so, he had drawn the same conclusions as so many of us – not from the romance of Latin nor the ravishing heaven-hungry beauty of the chant, nor the "silence", nor any vision of glamorous externals; no brocaded fiddlebacks nor incense-hazed high altars haunted his imagination (yet). The texts and the rubrics did it all on their own. A man after my own heart.
"Will the Old come back? Should I pray for its return?" – these were his immediate concerns, together with how best to assimilate the traditional liturgy into his devotional life, where no opportunity to live it fully and properly (in the Church and with the Church) existed. I told him right away – pray the Office anyway. Pray the Missal. Adopt both as the primary source and inspiration of your devotional life – but for the good of your soul, keep clear of TradWorld!The spontaneity of this last advice surprised me as much as its vehemence. "Where did that come from?" I had a vision of myself as a hooded spectre, indicating with horrid warning the unseen pit, from which groans, muted screams and abandoned ullulations were suddenly audible. I am of course, a denizen of the pit, acclimatised to its acrid, sulphurous bowels, having spent most of my adult life there. I’m a Trad: one of those whom the abnormality of the times has compelled into a variety of absurd and unnatural postures; one of the mad, driven in my leisure hours to the digestion of turgid encyclicals in order to defend what ought to be self-evident; to contrive some kind of "systematic statement of the obvious" in the face of universal denial and purblind stupidity. Has it done me any good? Well has it?
I think this post on The Undercroft was very thoughtful.
Loading ...
When this cradle Catholic, who lived through Vatican II, surfaced from six or so years of deep involvement with the SSPX it took many years to get the bad taste and bad memories to go away. The only good thing is as a “revert†I found the real church via the SSPX. The horrific things I witnessed when I was a so-called trad are so numerous the contemplation of a book has been high on my list. There is a huge SSPX presence as well as a large sedevecantist (sp?) group where I live and it produces continuing drama. I NOTHING good to say about these folks so I try to say nothing at all.
Point well taken, Father. I’m glad to see this subject being approached from the missal as such, rather than simply from the perspective of the ethos or the ars celebrandi.
However, is that not also important? For many, it’s the beauty that leads them into the TLM (I grant that much of this beauty can be transferred to the NOM, but generally it is not done), and then they discover it’s other strengths. So I think this is an “et” situation, rather than an either or.
I fully concur, however, with “staying out of trad world.” That part I’ve not problem with.
Adrienne. I hear ya.
I was this close to unpoping. I was part of a trad study group and a few of our members did unpope. I was a regular “Indultie” (not an intended complement by those who coined that neologism) but I stopped going when my convert-from-Congregationalism Bride noted how often the Priest’s sermons were of a us (Indulties) vs them (Nervous Order) binary variety and how much that upset her.
(And when The Bride is unhappy the whole family is unhappy)
Now, I mainly just ache at Mass. I know how bad the translations are. I knew the old Missal Mass by heart. I can not stand what passes for “music” at the various Parishes I have called home.
It has been more than two score years since the end of Vatican Two and I have yet to go to one – ONE – Mass that I could say was what Vatican Two intended.
And so I have suffered, largely silently, trying to do what I think is right.
I remain convinced I will not hear Mass like it is intended unless I witness my own funeral.
At The Bride’s request I am writing my funeral Mass. It was pretty easy, of course. I am just using the Old Missal with the Dies Irae sequence.
She thinks she can convince our Pastor to say the old Mass at my funeral.
I once said that I’d die to hear the old mass again. Little did I know how prophetic I was.
Many thanks for your kind words, Father
By “TradWorld” the author seems to mean what he finds on the internet
Well, kind of; I’d say, rather, that it’s typified by what one finds on the internet. The “archipelago” reference isn’t really to Solzhenitsyn’s novel (which to my shame I’ve yet to read), but to TradWorld as something that subsists (sorry!) in variety of locations and manifestations; all over one’s bookshelves; among one’s friends; in last week’s sermon; not least inside one’s own head.
This certainly strikes a chord with me. My own path was a little different in that my reflection on the texts of the traditional liturgy came not only before I encountered actual celebrations of it, but also before my conversion. Dissatisfaction with the modern Roman-style liturgy that I was used to as an Anglican prompted me to study the traditional liturgy. This took place in parallel with a growing awareness of the theological weakness of the Anglican position. Nonetheless, I am aware of what a profound transformation can arise from simply immersing oneself in the liturgical books, even without the opportunity to assist at traditional services.
The TradWorld comment is also true, and I think very well put here, and in moretben’s comment. There is a self-righteous danger in identifying groups “out there,” or even individuals, as bitter people who have lost their way, in contrast to onself. There is a standing temptation in these “unnatural times” for all orthodox people to corrosive anger, resentment, rash judgment, bitterness and similar sins, as we cannot help but notice the wounded state of the Church around us. I doubt there are many of us who overcome those temptations all the time, especially internally.
A reminder of the need for us all to sweeten the “sour grapes” that grow within us all from time to time is welcome, and the warning for someone new to the dangers it is particularly valuable.
Father, you pointed exactly the problem why I have a great reluctance into embracing the Tridentine Mass, not because of it, but mainly because of who are in it. (Let’s not generalized though)
BUT I’ve got a friend who got into it and see the free masons everywhere, at one point or another I encounter systematic criticism of the Holy Father, fan club of Fr. Gruner( Fatima, obsviously the third secret has not been revealed and Russia not consecrated) and heard about the Novos ordo people!
I don’t want Kumbaya but I don’t want that attitude either. I just want to worship in chartity the Lord the way He wants us to worship Him, be it Novus Ordo or Tridentine Mass. Right now I just don’t feel at home, but I remember Christ barely felt it on the Cross either.
I just hope just for a Mass said by the book, the one given by the Magisterium not from our pride.
the need for us all to sweeten the “sour grapes†that grow within us all from time to time
That’s it, Cerimoniere. Exactly. A reminder too, that Our Lord will not ask us at our particular judgement if Russia was consecrated, or Fr Feeney unjustly punished, or if Archbishop Bugnini rolled his trouser-leg.
moretben writes:
TradWorld . . . subsists (sorry!) in variety of locations and manifestations; all over one’s bookshelves; among one’s friends; in last week’s sermon; not least inside one’s own head.
Hmmm, I’m sorry but now I’m more confused than ever. What ought I to be avoiding again? ;-)
Yes, there are some areas of “TradWorld” that ought to be avoided (this site excepted of course), but my own experience leads me to believe that certain segments of the “conservative Catholic” world are equally dangerous, if not more so. YMMV.
I too have lately been “driven in my leisure hours to the digestion of turgid encyclicals [and stuff] in order to defend what ought to be self-evident; to contrive some kind of ‘systematic statement of the obvious’ in the face of universal denial and purblind stupidity.”
Is this bad? Seriously, I would like to know. If anyone has gone before me I would much appreciate being warned of the dangers. So far it has only struck me as seriously enlightening.
I would be very interested the know the author’s answer to his closing question, “Has it done me any good?”
Spartacus – Hello to a fellow traveler. We can import a priest for your funeral Mass although the one our pastor does in English is very reverent. He will also do the Latin Mass if need be.
Since my husband and I are musicians the music makes us cringe but over all our pastor (and good friend) does a correct and reverent Mass.
We are in a unique position because when we left the SSPX a hoard came with us to our communities “real†Catholic church. They have their own Fraternity of St. Peter priest, their own Tridentine Mass and have essentially become their own “church within a churchâ€. It is what finally drove us completely away from this group. All their baggage came with them and they have become a costly thorn in the side of the parish. They have caused an untold amount of damage to the Body of Christ. If you haven’t visited http://societyofstleoi.blogspot.com/. — you will love the humor. It is good to laugh and let the Holy Spirit do His job of protecting the Church.
So true, Moretben. Part of the problem, of course, is that some personalities find it easier to be in a contra mundumposition than others, and that TradWorld therefore tends to gather a disproportionate amount of contrarian types, who relish confrontation and insist upon their pet theories.
The other side of this, as we have discussed, is that someone who has been forced into such a position on genuine principle is exposed to its besetting temptations, and risks allowing himself to become formed by his unfortunate circumstances. That’s one of the reasons I so admire those older than myself who have succeeded in preserving charity and hope as well as faith throughout the worst of the past decades.
Mark
I ask the question because I don’t know. The encyclicals are there to be read. No doubt I know certain things now that I didn’t know before. It comes at a price though. I won’t be saved because I can quote Mirari Vos. I might be damned because I can do so as a consequence of time taken from my children.
DCS
You’re not confused. You get it just fine.
I had something to contribute. It was probably even quasi-pithy.
But I was completely derailed by the anti-spam word, which has quite brought me to my senses and refocused my attention on something probably more worthy:
“Pray for our bishops”
Amen, Fr. Z, and thank you!
Moretben:
I think I’m getting it now, thanks to your response and others’ comments. It’s not that learning the traditional viewpoint is bad per se, it’s that, among other things, one should not obsess over it at the cost of losing one’s charity or of the neglect of one’s duties.
Phew! I’m glad that’s all it is. I’m only listening to recorded lectures on my way to work, and started attending an Indult Mass about a month ago. It’s great and the thought of going back to an N.O. Mass is distasteful. But I don’t question the N.O.’s validity. The MP strikes me as the perfect compromise: Let us trads have the old one, let the libs have the new one, and let’s see where it goes, not forcing anything on anyone but also not suppressing it.
Forgive me if this is off-topic, but this seems like a good crowd to ask: Can anyone give me an opinion on the teachings of Dr. John Rao?
Spartacus – Hello to a fellow traveler. We can import a priest for your funeral Mass although the one our pastor does in English is very reverent. He will also do the Latin Mass if need be.
Hello back at ya, sister. My Pastor is a convert from So. Baptism who read his way into the Church while at UChicago. Incredibly bright, his Masses are fine but he defers to the Music Ministry, or whatever it is called now.
For awhile I had him saying “..say but the word and my soul shall be healed.” but he abruptly stopped. I never knew why.
And every time he says the Roman Cannon I give him $25.00 as I greet him on the way out of Mass. He just laughs and shakes his head.
Every Holy Thursday I buy him “Father’s Day” presents like Victoria’s Tenebrae Responsories and Palestarina’s Missa Papae Marcelli” and hope for the best.
Meanwhile, at Mass it is all Haugen all the time.
In the meantime, when rumors of the M.P. first surfaced, long ago, I spoke with him about it and told him I wanted to serve Mass for him and he didn’t react strongly either way.
My entire life I have been a misfit. I have lived in the dead Diocese of Maine. I now live in the dead Diocese of Palm Beach County Fl.
So, I am looking forward to me funeral :) I plan to buy my own coffin so I will finally have a place where I fit.
I think the the point of the post is really encapsulated, not in my own couple of paragraphs, but in the quotes they introduce. The one from Mosebach, and particularly The Good Town (in its entirety). The whole tragedy of our plight is captured in that poem.
Interestingly enough, I find that the Tradworld on Facebook is even worse than in the blogosphere. With blogs, you can usually differentiate between ones faithful to Holy Mother Church and ones that are not, and once you’ve figured it out it’s easy to stay away from ones that aren’t. This isn’t true in Facebook (kind of like in real life), where the lines are much more blurred.
It has just occured to me, though, that a bunch of you have no clue what I’m talking about …
“The idea of WDTPRS is to help people get into the primary texts of the prayers and therefore come to love their content. The content of the prayers is not just words but The Word made flesh.”
Yes! That’s why I first came to visit WDTPRS and why I still enjoy and get so much from the podcasts. It would be lovely to get back to those primary texts of the prayers and the Fathers.
Perhaps once the Motu Proprio has arrived and the Tridentine Mass is back, it will be possible for everyone to stop carping at the “whiners” in THE TABLET and AMERICA (and Bp Trautman) — who in turn carp at the traditionalist “whiners”.
There’s so much to learn from the liturgy, both NO and Tridentine. Why not get back to that?
Pardon the uninitiated of us(me) but i used “the google”(heh)
and couldn’t find out what tradworld means! anyone willing to dumb it
down and spell it out barney style for me? i’d really appreciate it!
Eric,
Look around. I guess “tradworld” is the general community of websites, blogs, organizations and loose associations of people that identify as “traditionalists.”
Hope that helps!
WHEN I read this post I immediately assumed that TradWorld was an encoding for the fringe, ultraconservative schismatics, whose very break with Rome makes them suspect. They can be attractive in their liturgy and devotions, but they are often very scary in their thought. There is, of course, nothing wrong with Tradition. There is quite a bit wrong with Tradition that is twisted into pseudo-tradition (e.g. “the See is vacant,” “Vatican II is not a valid council,” et sim.). For those trying to figure out who can be trusted and who can’t, the answer is simple: those who follow the Magesterium humbly and faithfully can be trusted. Those who question the Church must be approached with great care.
WHEN I read this post I immediately assumed that TradWorld was an encoding for the fringe, ultraconservative schismatics, whose very break with Rome makes them suspect. They can be attractive in their liturgy and devotions, but they are often very scary in their thought. There is, of course, nothing wrong with Tradition. There is quite a bit wrong with Tradition that is twisted into pseudo-tradition (e.g. “the See is vacant,†“Vatican II is not a valid council,†et sim.). For those trying to figure out who can be trusted and who can’t, the answer is simple: those who follow the Magesterium humbly and faithfully can be trusted. Those who question the Church must be approached with great care.
FINALLY! A real Traditionalist – loyal to Tradition, loyal to the Church!
God Bless You, Mr. Crnkovic!
I, respectfully, disagree. TradWorld can be Catholics who are NOT schismatic. TradWorld can be Catholics who get so blasted persnickity about every honest mistake that a priest may make that they suck all the joy out of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
To me, there is a world of difference between an honest mistake versus a deliberate one. Trads can be folks who attack Father right after the Mass: “Oh, Father, you turned to the left and not the right” “Oh, Father, you forgot to tap your breast during the Confiteor” “You are not wearing buckles on your shoes” etc. etc.
I have not read Memoirs from the House of the Dead for a long time. However, I seem to recall there is a play for the inmates wherin the words and the action are all wrong but the inmates love it for the entertainment it is. In another scene the inmates go to Mass during Lent and are awed by the beauty and reverence of it even as they watch it in chains.
Words and rubrics matter, yes, but I think there is a point where we can get too critical. I think some trads cross the line and think the Mass is like a play to be reviewed and the priest is the actor to be criticized.
Sorry, if this makes no sense. It’s been a long day.
As a priest who celebrates both the Old and New Orders I must concur with Cathy of Alex, but this pernickity attitude is not confined just to rubrics: nor is ‘TradWorld’ confined just to those who attend the Old Order of Mass, be it celebrated under the Indult or otherwise. What it amounts to is that the denizens of ‘TradWorld’ approach a somewhat Protestant mentality whereby their private judgment is somehow superior to that of legitimate authority, such as the Magisterium or approved practices by the competent authority. [eg the issue of not eating meat on Fridays or substituting that penitential act with another]. This mentality is not confined only to the liturgy, it can be found in any and all areas of Church life; summed up in the expression, ‘more Catholic than the Pope.’ By the way, I know that some members of the Roman Curia refer to ‘Traddy Land’ rather than ‘TradWorld,’ but I think the two refer to the same problem.
Fr K
Hello all bloggers……….
I wandered onto this site by accident(maybe not?)
I an a middle aged (48y/o) women who grew up basically only knowing the Traditional Mass. My parents, God rest their soals, searched high and low for a Traditional Mass after moving from NY and eventually helped established a Church in the Pocono Mountains of PA. Before that time we would drive to Long Island every Sunday to attend Mass.
As all the changes in the Church continued I would always ask why would this happen and what was the motivation? What started to help me understand was twenty five years later reading the book by Malichi Martin “Windswept House”. This book was supposedly fiction but appeared to have names resembling the real live characters. I picked this book up from my parents house (after my Mother had died) and noticed my Mothers handwriting in the columns with names of people I recognized. The story is pretty amazing.
Well, as time has gone on I think I have recognized why the new Mass has been able to continue. The reason that the clergy in charge have allowed new non-music, an unholy atmosphere and sometimes “PTA meeting” like atmosphere in the “celebration” is because they don’t believe! This sounds very simple but I think they truely don’t believe that the host is truely the body and blood of Jesus Christ! If they did they wouldn’t wipe off the particles after touching the host on their vestments and or altar cloths. I unfortunately witnessed this by a Priest and Monsignor.
I hope I did’t bore you, but I would like you all to know that I consider my self a normal Traditional Catholic and not a phanatic as described above in some traditional groups. I would like to find and I believe there are other loving, kind, non-judgemental Tradional Catholics who would like to see a return to the Traditional Church where we all will be able to pray and feel the presence of God surrouding us.
Barbara
Fr. Holland and Fr. Z., may I apologize to you and to all priests for the times in the past when I’ve approached the Holy Sacrifice in this spirit?
One of the things about growing up in the post Conciliar Church is that I would frequently find out that such and such practice or thus and so at Mass was actually forbidden, abusive, etc. I usually felt betrayed when I would find out.
But now I have to watch myself; I was critical of something I was sure was “wrong”–till I saw the document explaining it, for instance; and I still have to ignore it when priests in my diocese routinely skip the “God the Father of mercies…” prayer in Confession and go straight from my Act of Contrition to the words of absolution. I know from talking to some of them that they truly believe this is allowed for pastoral reasons like a long line at Confession, and for the peace of my soul and in charity toward them all I can do is pray about it and hope the bishop will clarify at some point. But it has taken me a long time to stop being hypercritical, and I do sincerely regret it.
Cathy of Alex,
Sorry for any misunderstanding. I was not suggesting that TradWorld/TradLand was composed exclusively of schismatics. I was suggesting, however, that the initial advice to avoid the TradWorld needed to be underscored by the basic guideline of turning to the legitimate authority of Rome when confusion arises about the proper path.
Thanks for your comment on Dostoevsky’s …House of the Dead. Although it is his first major work after his Siberian exile it remains one of his most powerful. The contrast he makes between the silly, conflated attempts at dubious art by the “actors” and the profound spirituality of the majestic eastern Great Lenten Service is a masterpiece of literary comparison. I recommend that everyone read it for its depth of spiritual insight. (Hope this isn’t off-topic, Father; you started it..)
Fr. K: the denizens of ‘TradWorld’ approach a somewhat Protestant mentality whereby their private judgment is somehow superior to that of legitimate authority
RIGHT!! Well said.
Barbara: This sounds very simple but I think they truely don’t believe that the host is truely the body and blood of Jesus Christ!
In some cases this is, I suspect, sadly true. Otherwise, their “faith” as something conscious has been so sidetracked that it isn’t a function part of their daily lives. We need not impute malice here, just neglect.
Denis: Hope this isn’t off-topic
Hardly! I did start it. I brought it up for a reason.
You see, unlike some Catholic clergy out there (read: Chairman) I think these literary references aren’t toooo harrrrd for you.
I managed to work out all my frustration with this issue by typing what turned out to be several pages of drivel and now that I’ve gotten that out of my system I can condense my comments into the following:
Tradworld, if I understand the concept correctly, exists because the legitimate authorities at all levels have either remained silent or have sent mixed messages on a whole host of issues for going on half a century. People have been forced into, or happily embraced, functioning as their own personal sovereign pontiff. It’s wrong, it never should have happened, but it didn’t happen in a vacuum unless it was the vacuum of authority.
And before we get too carried away and start picking up stones, accept that most of “them” are in the position “they” are in because “they” have been abandoned and don’t know any other way to save their own souls, or, and I think this is most important, the souls of their children.
Avoid tradworld? For years I’ve been telling my protestant friends and family to avoid Catholics period, it’s the only way they have a chance of converting. But nevertheless and in all things, May Jesus Christ be praised, now and forever!
boredoftheworld,
It is true that many faithful Catholics have been bewildered and dismayed, even confused by mixed messages sent out by some who are supposed to be the shepherds of the flock over the years; however if we look at the history of the Church this is not a new phenomenon: think of why St Paul wrote his Letter to the Galatians for starters: then we can go to the Arian heresy right down to the present day. No doubt such things will happen in the future.
The important thing is to keep things in perspective and to remain open, faithful and obedient to the voice of the teaching authority of the Church – the Magisterium: and that also goes for practices that are approved which perhaps we don’t particularly like or even have our personal reservations about: we must accept them in a spirit of obedience; otherwise we do indeed run the risk of becoming ‘protestantized’ which can become, very rapidly, an habitual attitude of mind, leading to suspicion, negativity and a lot of unhappiness all round, and we then run the risk of leading people astray. [A simple example would be ‘Communion in the hand.’ I know many priests who have their own views and reservations about the practice but where it is allowed, they give communion in this way to those who wish it, because it is allowed by the lawful authority of the Church. To refuse would be like those priests who refuse Communion to those who prefer to receive on the tongue or who kneel to receive.]
Those who pride themselves on being faithful to ‘Tradition’ and then find themselves almost constantly at odds with the Pope and the bishops are not unlike the liberal dissenters they are so quick to point the finger at and condemn. Both groups are selective, both stand by their own private judgment on the teachings and legitimate directives of their pastors and to put it simply, both suffer from pride, thinking that they know better than the Pope and bishops in union with him, when in reality they are often quite ill-informed and don’t know as much as they think they do. ‘A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.’ I would say that every priest has encountered types like this somewhere along the line and dealing with them can be very taxing. One of the obvious advantages of being in full communion with the Catholic Church is that we don’t need to reinvent the wheel or go searching for the truth: we have it and we should be grateful instead of looking for opportunities to start carping.
Fr K
Tradworld?
I keep thinking back to the Catholicism of my youth…leavened bread, liturgical dancers in leotards, war protest songs instead of hymns, no catechism, guitar masses, masses where we sat around cross-legged in the rectory. Did the Bishop know what was going on? Maybe. Were the priests trying to create a different Catholicism, one in their own image? Definitely.
The boy who experienced that and miraculously managed not to lose his faith wanders into an indult mass one day and is drawn to the worship. But he finds a community that feels under siege, that is tightly proscribed by the bishop. It is allowed to exist as long as children are not catechized or confirmed by it. The priest is part time and the church building is allowed to be borrowed only when needed for nothing else.
Yet, Trads are somehow always the bad guys in everybody’s equation. Maybe Tradworld should be avoided. It is a cross and those who bear it are despised for it by many lay, priest, and bishop.
To be honest, I am not sure that further finger-pointing in the direction of embittered traditionalists will help anyone – other than to perhaps exonerate oneself in the eyes of others of the suspicion that because one is interested in the traditional liturgy that one is, ergo, embittered.
I’ve been in the Church for a year now and have been quite shocked by the terror which some people have tried to place around the Traditional Latin Mass. I’ve also been repelled by the sour monomania that I have encountered in a minority of people who attend the Traditional Latin Mass. However, I can’t help drawing a connection between these two attitudes – with the latter arising in reaction to the former.
Of course, we have free will and are not merely reacting automatons. Regardless of how badly someone who loves the traditional liturgy has been treated he cannot allow himself to endanger his soul by curling up in a little shell of anger and contempt for the rest of the visible Church.
I know people who have been treated like pariahs for asking for a Mass according to the 1962 Missal. I recently met an FSSP priest in Canada who said that for him the main benefit of these rumours about the motu proprio is that some of the other priests in his diocese had actually started speaking to him.
If we sincerely wish for a conversion of heart in those who are embittered – and not merely wish to use them as a foil to demonstrate to others that “we are not as they are” then perhaps we shouldn’t point the finger at them so much. But treat them charitably and with no little patience. Put love in and you might just get love out. Embittered traditionalists should not be beyond our solicitude!
Dear Father, Please excuse my ignorance on this topic but can the “Old Mass” be said in English?
Michael: Yet, Trads are somehow always the bad guys in everybody’s equation.
No, only the nasty ones.
Fr Peter: No, I think not.
Well, it kind of can, considering the Anglican Use. If only that was next on
the Holy Father’s list of things to be de-restricted.
Well, it kind of can, considering the Anglican Use.
No, the Anglican Use Mass, though hauntingly beautiful with it’s Elizabethan language, has liyylr more to to with the old Mass than does our new Mass. Rite One in The (Anglican Use) Book of Divine Worship starts with the opening prayers of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer — the Exhortation, Decalogue, Penitential rite, etc. The offertory rite is simply the stripped down “Blessed be God forever” non-oblational rite of the Novus Ordo. Then the Eucharistic Prayer is an old English translation of the Roman Canon with the Novus Ordo eucharistic proclamation inserted. The communion rite is (I believe) that of the BCP. In short the Anglican Use liturgy may well be in its beauty and reverence what we wished the Novus Ordo in common practice were, but it is not the traditional Roman rite translated into English.
Barbara: I would like to find and I believe there are other loving, kind, non-judgmental Traditional Catholics who would like to see a return to the Traditional Church where we all will be able to pray and feel the presence of God surrounding us.
Although also an admitted serial reader of Windswept House, I am (hopefully) reasonably sane in most other ways. Our local indult community is utterly faithful to Church, Magisterium, and Pope (and is so regarded in our diocese). Most if not all of its members, to whom the TLM is not available every Sunday, attend Novus Ordo Masses on the other Sundays, and many of us daily. Many if not most are visibly active members of their normative parishes.
Practically none of them exhibit the screwed-up faces and tight lips of the rad trads so often caricaturized. Of course, I’ve run across a handful of these bitter types from time to time over the years, but my own personal (and quite varied) TLM experience makes me wonder whether they aren’t a lot more prominent in the blogosphere than in the real world.
I stand [very] corrected. Apparently I should have a much more careful
comparison of the AU and the old rite.