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This just in from the Vancouver Sun:

Pope Benedict won’t attend Quebec’s 400th celebrations
 
Canwest News Service

Thursday, January 17, 2008

QUEBEC - Pope Benedict XVI will not come to Quebec City this summer for the 400th anniversary celebrations, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Quebec said Thursday.

Marc Cardinal Ouellet, archbishop of Quebec and primate of the church in Canada, has been lobbying for weeks for the pontiff to attend the International Eucharistic Congress slated for June, one of the biggest events of the city’s 400th birthday bash.

But Ouellet said in a brief press release that the Pope has chosen to send a representative to the congress that will bring together some 15,000 delegates and 50 cardinals from 60 countries.

A group of Quebec citizens had also launched a petition to encourage the Pope to attend the event that will culminate with a giant outdoor mass on the historic Plains of Abraham.

Too bad.

However, I understand the desire of the 80 year old Pontiff to be prudent.

I would like to have seen Pope Benedict XVI place Card. Ouellet, whom I know a little, more in the world spotlight.

I wonder if part of the reason that the Holy Father might not be going is that there is a new head of the Holy See’s office for Eucharistic Congresses, and that that new head might have something to say about the Mass in Quebec?

From the Wall Street Journal on Pope Benedict and La Sapienza.

   

Papal Inquisition
January 17, 2008; Page A16

American universities aren’t the only places where politically incorrect speakers are silenced nowadays. This week in Rome, of all places, Pope Benedict XVI found himself censored by scholars, of all people, at one of Europe’s most prestigious universities.  [As I said in another entry, this is a PR nightmare for La Sapienza and the lefty groups the protesting profs and students identity with.]

On Tuesday the pontiff canceled a speech scheduled for today at Sapienza University of Rome in the wake of a threat by students and 67 faculty members to disrupt his appearance. The scholars argued that it was inappropriate for a religious figure to speak at their university.

This pope’s specific sin was a speech he gave nearly 20 years ago in which, they claimed, he indicated support for the 17th-century heresy trial against Galileo. The censoring scholars apparently failed to appreciate the irony that, in preventing the pope from speaking, they were doing to him what [some people falsely claim] the Church once did to Galileo, stifling free speech and intellectual inquiry.

One of Benedict’s favorite themes is that European civilization derives from the rapprochement between Greek philosophy and religious belief, between Athens and Jerusalem. In the speech he wasn’t allowed to give, the pope planned to talk about the role of popes and universities.

It is a pope’s task, he wrote, to "maintain high the sensibility for the truth, to always invite reason to put itself anew at the service of the search for the true, the good, for God." La Sapienza—which means "wisdom"—was founded by one of the pope’s predecessors in 1303. Another unappreciated irony.

Folks,... do any of you use G-Mail?

Let me know what you think of it.

The Italian left and La Sapienza in Rome had better know they really blew it with the Pope, the press, and the Italian people when even radical anti-Catholic left-wing weirdos like Dario Fo say that an opportunity to listen to the Pope was lost.

Get this from the Roman daily Il Messaggero.

Dario Fo gets into the general attitude about how badly the radicals screwed up.  However, throughout he cannot resist telling the Church how it ought to give into the ways of the world.  But just enjoy that part!

My translation:

A chance to understand Benedict XVI… lost

by Dario Fo

"The faith must not be imposed in an authoritative manner, it can only be given in freedom".  Pope Ratzinger surprises us yet again.  The speech he would have given at La Sapienza, whose text I had occasion to read yesterday afternoon, not only recognizes (and it would have been a recognition coram populo, in a Roman University setting), the autonomy of science and the law concerning it, but adds also some "astonishing" clarifications.  "... Pastoral ministry is to keep awake a sensitiveness about the Truth, to invite reason to place itself in the search for the true, the good, of God."  Not enough.  The Pope defines these things that "emerge through the history of the Christian faith" as ony "useful lights".  No extremism, it would seem, in these words. More or less, obscurantism.

In other terms, the Pontiff seems to "propose" Jesus Christ and the Christian Catholic faith as one of those good routes (naturally, as far as concerns his ministry, the privileged route) to "find a way toward the Future)".  All in all, in Rome an optima occasion was lost (and we have all lost it, really) finally to understand just who Ratzinger is: not the man whom many of us think he may be.  He doesn’t want to impose, but counsel. He expresses hope, he doesn’t command.  He helps, doesn’t constrain.  In the end, he wants us all united and with a single desirable common objective: that celebrated Truth.  

So, why, I ask myself as a secular layman, and I have been an admirer of the charismatic Wojtyla style, Ratzinger acts in an opposite way from what he says?  Why the absence openness, his "no’s", his bans in the matter of procreation, of priesthood for women, his excommunications?  Why the knack of snuffing out certain popular "concessions" made during the Second Vatican Council, just look at the position of the priest at the altar during Mass and the use of national vernaculars in place of the anachronistic Latin?  It would be necessary to see it this way: the mystery of Faith.  It is worthwhile reading over and over again the address the philosopher Pope would have given at Rome’s La Sapienza.  There are openings in it, apparent or real as they may be, to which we haven’t been accustomed, at least not in concrete deeds.  Perhaps the university environment, the city of studies, reconnects the Pontiff with the practice of freedom which even he, (I am sure) was used to before he took his throne.

UPDATE: 19 Jan 07 – 22:07 GMT 

If you want to hear and watch Dario Fo speak on these same issues, there was an interview with him on RAI, Italian TV.

 

Here is an idea.

The President of the Chamber of Deputies, radical Communist Fausto Bertinotti must invite the Pope to address the Italian Parliment.  The Center Right is infuriated.  Catholics are infuriated.  The center left is even angry.  The center left government of Romano Prodi hangs by a thread of left-wing coalitions.   If Bertinotti invites the Pope, the loony left would go bananas, but who cares?  It would steal a march on the center right.  

Even if Card. Bertone and the Pope decline, the solution was offered and everybody wins.

How will Italy look in April when the ultra-left UN, full of representatives of dictatorial governments, receives the Pope around the time of his having issued his social encyclical?

So, invite the Pope to Parliment and the whole thing starts to resolve.

You can bet Bertinotti has thought of this.

In the meantime, consider the reaction of the folks with their heads screwed on correctly at La Sapienza at the absence of the Pope from their gathering.  They read his speech aloud.  SKYTG24 had coverage:

Once upon a time in Velletri, the main city of of the Suburbicarian Diocese of Velletri-Segni, at the Church of St. Anthony the Abbot, I did on this day stand outside the homonymous church in cassock, surplice, stole and biretta blessing pigs and horses.

I found a photo page of this event in Velletri.

The photos are not of the year I did this, but they are from Velletri, depicting the same event in another year.

COLLECT:
Deus, qui beato Antonio abbati
tribuisti mira tibi in deserto conversatione servire,
eius nobis interventione concede,
ut, abnegantes nosmetipsos,
te iugiter super omnia diligamus

Anyone want to take a crack at this?

NEWS FLASH!

The Holy See has moved the bishop of the birthplace of St. Augustine of Hippo, the north African town of Tagaste, ... well… moved the titular bishop.

NOMINA DEL NUNZIO APOSTOLICO IN RWANDA

Il Santo Padre Benedetto XVI ha nominato Nunzio Apostolico in Rwanda S.E. Mons. Ivo Scapolo, Arcivescovo titolare di Tagaste, finora Nunzio Apostolico in Bolivia.

We return now to our usual program. 

There is an article in The Catholic Herald about Summorum Pontificum.  Shall we have a look?

My emphases and comments.  

The Motu Proprio must not become a political football

Supporters and opponents of the reform have lost all perspective, says Anthony Symondson SJ

On the July 7, 2007 the Holy Father promulgated a Motu Proprio, Summorum Pontificum, which authorised the celebration of the Tridentine rite. On September 14 it came into force and in the ensuing four months the 1962 Roman Missal is now permitted to be freely used privately and publicly in cathedrals, parish churches, abbeys, conventual chapels and oratories of religious orders. I welcomed this initiative because it finally resolved a dispute about the lawful authority of using the rite and cleared up a controversy on whether it had been abrogated by the promulgation of the Roman Missal of 1970. The rite of 1970 remains the ordinary form of the Catholic Church; the Tridentine rite of St Pius V, as revised by Blessed John XXIII, becomes the extraordinary form. Liturgical continuity between the present and the past has been re-established.

The Motu Proprio was welcomed by traditionalist Catholics all over the world. Others, many in positions of authority, were dismayed by it. But I think it can safely be said that the majority of Catholics universally were either unaware that it had been promulgated, or were indifferent, or nonplussed about what the Tridentine rite is. Effectively the extraordinary form is an unknown rite to all but the initiated, [But think about how many people that is?  The "initiated" must include all those who grew up before the Council, right?] and the powerful response from those who warm to its restoration and those who oppose it should be seen within this reality. The worship of the Catholic Church remains predominantly defined by the Missal of Pope Paul VI – the ordinary form – and this is likely to continue for decades hence.  [Decades?  I wonder.  Years, for sure.] It is used by the Holy Father daily.  [Says who?  I thnk we need a confirmation of this.]

There are problems of implementing the Motu Proprio in the United Kingdom. Many have already been identified in recent episcopal directions but these have been interpreted as enforcing concerted obstacles to applying Summorum Pontificum and the practicality of doing so has been overlooked. First, there is the question of demand. When bishops have said in the past that there is no demand for the rite some traditionalists have seen this as a euphemism for inaction. Not long ago I had a conversation with a priest who regularly celebrates the rite all over the country and he confirmed that the demand for it is small.  [Now.]

In comparison with France, where there has been a continuous use of the rite since 1965, there has been limited continuity here outside Lefebrvrist circles. The Latin Mass Society was founded to promote and protect its use and it has succeeded in keeping the line of continuity open. [Note how often the writer uses this word.] Praise God for that because without the Society the ground for the Motu Proprio would be less fertile than it is. But it is a small ground and it will take a long time for the territory to be extended. The Society’s list of churches where the rite is regularly celebrated shows that it is a largely urban phenomenon.

If the Tridentine rite is to be used it must be said well, not mouthed. [Yes, indeed.  This is a very good point.] Latin has not been taught in seminaries on the universal basis of years past, and since 1965 generations of priests have been ordained who are unfamiliar with it. But among those who are, many have never celebrated the rite; they are only familiar with the Novus Ordo, whether said in Latin or English. Their liturgical formation has been regulated by it, they have internalised it, and it has become their daily bread. In consequence many are indifferent to the Motu Proprio.  [On the other hand, those who learn the older form of Mass quickly begin to reassess what Mass is all about and who they are as priests.]

In the summer I spent time with a bishop from an English-speaking country overseas who has often said the Tridentine rite in addition to regularly using the Novus Ordo. He is a good Latinist and in sympathy with its use but he said that before doing so he had to practise for days ahead in order to celebrate it efficiently. It is not part of his daily liturgical life and, despite his linguistic skills, he is unable to internalise and offer it as effortlessly as he does the Novus Ordo in Latin. Despite his good will, he said that he could not implement the Motu Proprio on a general basis in his diocese because of the unfamiliarity of his priests and people with Latin and the rite. For the time being, he is forced by circumstances to regard it as an occasional occurrence. I imagine that this thinking also occupies the minds of other bishops, including those who do not read Latin.  [We must repeat this often: No one expected huge changes instantly.  Time will tell.  What is needed is good will, which this bishop demonstrated for all of the practical difficulties he faces.]

So where does that leave Britain? There is much talk about a new generation of young priests and lay people who are thirsting for the extraordinary form. We are told that the seminaries of the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter, the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest and similar bodies are bursting to capacity while diocesan seminaries lie empty. There are young people who have discovered and love the Tridentine rite, as Juventutem proves. But in these islands they represent a small, special, if highly motivated, group who are unrepresentative of their contemporaries.  [Rather like the Apostles, or the seven founders of the Servites, or the first Jesuits, or the first Franciscans, or the first…. [fill in the blank]....] Youth develops and early enthusiasm does not always presage permanence. The Tridentinist seminaries are indeed full but there are not many of them and in comparison with seminaries worldwide, they represent a small proportion of the whole. It is with this generation that the implementation of Summorum Pontificum lies.

What is clear is that many young practising Catholics have a deep seriousness about their faith because it represents a reaction against the religious indifference of the majority of their contemporaries. They are the children of Pope John Paul II, until his death the only pope they have known, and are to be found among the generation aged between 18 and 35. They are not in reaction against the Church, as some of their immediate and not-so-immediate forebears were, but see Catholicism as a positive option that is to be accepted and lived. Some have come to prefer traditional worship in reaction to what they see as the dated liturgical expression of their parents’ and grandparents’ generation, but others are content with what they find in the average parish. The majority of the new lay movements are not Tridentinist and they are where many of the young are to be found.  [That is a very important point.]

Some traditionalists are frustrated that progress in the implementation of Summorum Pontificum is slow. [Yes, they are.  And they should be more prudent and patient.  Brick by brick!] Others have convinced themselves that, with a stroke of the pen, the Holy Father has excised the developments of the last 40 years and the Church is back where it was at the time of the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958. [Piffle.] They are mistaken in thinking that this is what the hermeneutic of continuity means; tradition goes back further than Trent and it is not a static force. Some priests and lay people have come to hate the Novus Ordo and seek only the Tridentine rite in exclusive terms. This goes against the Motu Proprio and does no service towards its implementation.  [That’s right.]

The new situation created by Summorum Pontificum needs patience, resolution and charity. [Exactly right.] If the Tridentine Rite is to be made a freely accessible part of Catholic worship once more attitudes must change on both sides and generosity of spirit encouraged. [Well said.] The Holy Father has emancipated one of the most precious legacies of the Church and its sacredness should not make it a pawn in a battle of wits.  [It has been promoted from "football" to "pawn".  Mixing metaphors a little, but who cares.]

You can read the rest of our comment pieces in this week’s Catholic Herald

I think this is a very good and well-balanced article.  I congratulate the writer.

People who want the older form of Mass would do well to reflect on it.

I was sent these by e-mail from a reader

This is the FSSP in a gathering in 2006:

This is the 2008 General Congregation of Jesuits in Rome:

 

Here is a piece from Catholic News Service about ad orientem celebration of Mass. 

Let’s have a look with my emphases and comments.

Not exactly ‘ad orientem’

Some media are reporting that Pope Benedict celebrated Mass “ad orientem” — facing toward the east — last Sunday when he used the Sistine Chapel’s historic main altar for the first time in decades.

That’s not literally correct. In fact, it’s off by 180 degrees. Because the chapel’s altar is built on the western wall, the change meant the pope was facing west during much of the liturgy.  [This is geographically accurate.  But that is decidedly not the point.  The theological point is that when the congregation and priest face the same directions, no matter what the compass point is, they are facing the liturgical East.  That is what ad orientem means.]

On the contrary, “ad orientem” was the direction popes faced when they used the free-standing portable altar in the Sistine: the celebrant faced east when he faced the people.  [Again, the compass point is really not the point.]

I spoke the other day to Msgr. Enrico Vigano, who has worked many years in the Vatican’s liturgical office, and he agreed that the term “ad orientem” doesn’t make sense in the Sistine Chapel.  [Maybe literally.]

Instead, he said, his office made reference to the cross, which stood on the main altar, framed by Michelangelo’s fresco of the Last Judgment. The idea here — and it’s one Pope Benedict has made in the past — is that when the pope and the people face the cross together, it emphasizes that the Mass is a common act of worship.  [Well… maybe.  However, Papa Ratzinger is very carefull in pointing out in his writings that ad orientem worship is extremely important and that if one cannot have ad orientem worship, one can at least have the Cross in a position between the celebrant and the altar so that it becomes the point of focus.  So, for Pope Benedict, it is best to have ad orientem worship with the congregation and priest facing the Cross together, but as second best one could have the Cross between the people and priest in a prominent way.  This is explained by Papa Ratzginer in one of my PODCAzTs.]

In early Christian churches, facing the cross coincided with facing east, the direction of the rising sun and, in a figurative sense, of the resurrection and the second coming.

But the Christian tradition of worshipping “ad orientem” faded, and over the last 500 years many churches have been built facing different directions, including one not far from the Sistine Chapel — St. Peter’s Basilica, which also faces west.  [That’s right.  Mostly because people had the flexibility of mind to understand that facing the liturgical east was the point, not necessarily facing the eastern compass point.  Also, St. Peter’s had to be built in the way it was, because of the shape of the Vatican Hill.]

Whatever a church’s compass orientation, some have wondered whether the papal Mass last Sunday marked the beginning of a trend. Are we going to see a Vatican effort to turn all the altars back to the pre-Vatican II position?  [Well… the point of a "trend" is that there are more than one instance, right?]

Probably not. Pope Benedict weighed in on this when he was a cardinal. He said he agreed with theological arguments for the priest and the people facing the same direction, but thought it would leave Catholics more confused than ever if the altars were turned around again.  [This is not entirely accurate.  He said that it would not be good to confusion through abrupt changes.  When it would be not possible to implement a shift to ad orientem celebration quickly or without confusion, then it would be better to place the Cross in the center.  The point is that he wanted to avoid the sort of confusion that abrupt changes caused decades ago.]

“Therefore, I’m not aiming at a practical application at this time,” he said.

That was in 1993, however, and one big thing has changed: he’s now pope. 

While this article was not entirely negative, I think it tugs the readers understanding in the wrong direction. 

A couple things about the Pope cancelling his visit to La Sapienza:

As you know, the Pope was scheduled to visit this famous Roman University.  Some 67 profs/academics then said the Pope condoned the 1633 trial of Galileo.  The Pope, the Church were anti-science, etc.   Leftists and homosexuals then fanned the flames among students.  Some of them took up the cause, even taking over the University rector’s office and promising a massive 1968 style protest.  The Holy See cancelled the visit.  Italian Interior Minister Amato begged Card. Bertone, Secretary of State, and the Pope not to cancel: the Italian government knew this would be a public relations nightmare.  Remember the statement of the Holy See?  Italy cannot provide the sort of security that the dignity the Holy Father is "is owed".  

I must ask: Just how serious is Physics at La Sapienza?  Just what level of scholar attacked the Pope about Galileo?  What sort of rep does La Sapienza’s faculty have, anyway?

But I digress.

The Pope’s speech.

Keep in mind what I have written before.  The Church was effectively marginalized for decades in Italy because the Italian bishops were brow-beaten into letting the Christian Democrat (DC) party politicians filter the Catholic message to the Italian people.  However, the DC has long since adopted a policy of compromise with Communists and Socialists, even since the time of De Gasperi and DC’s founding.  The DC collapsed under its own mediocrity and corruption and the bishops were left in a void, no longer used to expressing anything important in the public square and with no strong leadership, even from the Holy See.   Slowly but surely, the Church in Italy has recovered its voice.  Church leaders have gotten involved in the public square.  However, after decades of having no serious opposition, the Left is in a panic because the Italian Church is weighing in on assisted fertilization, civil unions for homosexuals, euthanasia, abortion, etc. The Left and the deviants (sexual and political, such as anarchists) are unhappy about this muscular Catholic Church which has reemerged.  The reaction of the Left, the anarchists and the deviants has been violent, including death threats against Card. Bagnasco, president of the Bishops Conference.

It doesn’t take much to start an avalanche when tensions are high.  This whole recent conflict started probably because some 50 or so people at La Sapienza were stupid. 

To my mind Card. Bertone scores high marks in this debacle: he kept the Pope out of a circus, rather, a riot.   While some at La Sapienza are now saying that they just wanted to be heard, blah blah blah, there were extremists involved who would have caused violent protests.  There would have been endless TV footage of students with Che Guevara t-shits and cross-dressing deviant wieros carrying moronic signs and throwing things, Carabinieri and police in riot gear with shields, maybe a little tear gas.  Some damn fool student would have been injured or killed, etc. etc.  That’s simply what happens in Italian student protests.  Remember the G8 meeting in Genoa?

Canceling the visit ultimately had to go well for the Holy See and very badly for the Left in Italy, including the present left-wing Italian government.  This is, in fact, a public relations nightmare for the Italian state.  Even many Italian leftists can’t stand what is going on and are attacking those responsible.  Even the German and Spanish press are against the University and supporting the Pope’s right to have been well-received. 

Universities far and wide are now tripping over their feet to invite the Pope.  The press has shifted to the Pope’s side.  The Italian people are in a vast majority favorable toward the Pope in this matter.

Now, out of the sun, zooms Camillo Card. Ruini, the Pope’s Vicar for Rome. 

Some insider Holy See baseball: Card. Bertone and Card. Ruini are not said not to be completely friendly on all issues.  Keep in mind that just last week Card. Bertone felt he had to backpeddle about the speech the Holy Father made when Rome’s Socialist mayor Veltroni paid a visit. His Holiness took Card. Ruini’s line about the problems in Rome, using some pretty hard language.  Veltroni, who is leader of his party, and therefore important to the coalition controlling the Italian government right now, went away furious.  Card. Bertone backpedaled.  After that PR problem for the Holy See, Card. Ruini, Vicar of Rome, is now calling for all of Rome to turn out and be at St. Peter’s this Sunday for a massive rally in support of the Holy Father! 

I am told that virtually every ecclesiastical institute in Rome has been sent faxes and e-mails from the Vicariate of Rome pretty much ordering everyone to be at St. Peter’s on Sunday. 

This will be huge.  What we are looking at is Family Day redivivus.  Except this time the institutional Church is taking a leading role.

FLASHBACK: Remember years ago when John Paul II was booed in Nicaragua?  The then Vicar of Rome Card. Poletti organized a similar day of "reparation" on the Sunday following JP II’s return. 

This is almost like a revival of a Holy See v. Communism Cold War.

(How many of you know Don Camillo and his Communist mayor rival Peppone?)

I got this by e-mail:

It is my sincere honor to inform all of you who have yet to hear that as of 3:00PM today, Wednesday January 16th, Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J. has been approved by Ave Maria University (The Chaplain’s Office) to publicly celebrate the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass according to the 7th Editio Typical of the Missale Romanum promulgated by Blessed Pope John XXIII of 1962 in the ballroom Chapel in the Student Union Building  During a meeting of all the Priests on campus this afternoon (1:30PM-3:00PM), Fr. Fessio explained to his brother Priests that he has received his Certification [The idea that Fr. Fessio needed certification to say Mass is very strange.  It does not seem to be in keeping with Summorum Pontificum.] to celebrate the Mass in this form per request of His Excellency Bishop Dewane of the Diocese of Venice, Florida which was administered by Fr. James Fryar, FSSP this past Saturday night, Fr. Fryar being the Bishop’s delegate to Ave Maria in matters of the Extraordinary Form of the Mass. It is prudent to also note that Fr. Eamon McManus and Fr. Matt Lamb are also willing and capable of celebrating the Mass according to the Extraordinary Form but have yet to receive their certification from Fr. Fryar to fulfill Bishop Dewane’s request. As of this moment, Fr. Fessio has been approved for public celebration at the following times:

Wednesday (weekly): 7:00AM or 7:50AM (yet to be finalized)
Sunday (weekly): 8:00AM (a new slot of 9AM will be created to retain the celebration of the Mass according to the Ordinary Form in Latin)

However, Fr. Fessio will be out of town this upcoming Sunday the 20th, hence the first celebration of the Extraordinary Form of the Mass will be one week from today at either 7:00AM or 7:50AM in the ballroom Chapel.