Pope Benedict sent a letter in Latin to Card. Sodano, whom His Holiness appointed as his delegate to the celebration for the 90th Anniversary of the Apparitions of the Blessed Virgin at Fatima.
There is nothing in this letter about either the "fourth" secret or the Motu Proprio.
It seems to be a day about news that is not really news at all.
Here is the Letter:
Venerabili Fratri Nostro
ANGELO S.R.E. Cardinali SODANO
Cardinalium Collegii DecanoNonaginta ante annos, divinum auxilium certaeque spei nuntium allatura, gregem suum custodientibus et valde stupentibus tribus parvis pastoribus Fatimae caelestis Regina Pacis benigna apparuit. Cuius suavem tutelam plurimi fideles sunt experti, qui variis in periculis sub eius praesidium confugiunt.
Poscente igitur Venerabili Fratre Antonio Augusto dos Santos Marto, Episcopo Leiriensi-Fatimensi, una cum Conferentia Episcopali Lusitaniae, libenter occasione XC expleti anni post inceptas apparitiones Beatissimae Virginis Mariae mittimus Fatimam Legatum Nostrum; quod munus tibi concredimus, Venerabilis Frater Noster, Ecclesiae fideli benemerito Praesuli et Immaculatae Virgini Mariae devoto filio. Nostras igitur vices illic ages, sollemnibus praesidebis ritibus, adstantibus significabis salutationem Nostram et praecipuam ostendes benevolentiam ac in spiritu praesentiam.
Bene in animo tenemus singularem pietatem et gratitudinem, quam habuit erga Dei Genetricem Ioannes Paulus II, Decessor Noster venerandae memoriae, qui ibi viginti quinque ante annos Virgini Mariae gratias egit pro vitae suae mirabiliter servatae dono simulque christifideles cunctos hortatus est ad monita et desideria eius exsequenda. Quapropter Nos, qui iam antea hoc sanctuarium invisimus et ex officio Praefecti Congregationis pro Doctrina Fidei nuntium pastoribus a Beata Virgine Maria creditum perscrutati sumus, cupimus ut denuo orationis sancti rosarii pondus et hunc caelestem nuntium proponas christifidelibus, ut praerogativas gratiasque consequantur quas ipsa Mater Redemptoris colentibus suum Cor immaculatum promisit.
Dum quidem legationem tuam precibus comitamur atque una cum tot in mundo credentibus a caelesti Regina pacem praesertim imploramus, quam solus Christus dare potest, Benedictionem Nostram Apostolicam, divinae gratiae auspicem atque propensae Nostrae caritatis testem, tibi in primis impertimus, Venerabilis Frater Noster, quam Leiriensis -Fatimensis dilectae Ecclesiae sacrorum Antistiti, ceteris etiam adstantibus Episcopis, presbyteris, religiosis viris et mulieribus cunctisque sacras celebrationes participantibus communicabis.
Ex Aedibus Vaticanis, die XIII mensis Aprilis, anno MMVII, Pontificatus Nostri secundo.
BENEDICTUS PP. XVI
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A letter dated May 5 is not likely to be released May 5; even the letters dating the new Divine Office in 1971 and 1985 were dated Easter Sunday, April whatever in those respective years, and I doubt there was a document release/press conference/vel sim. on those Easter Days.
When/if the Motu Proprio ever appears, it could well be dated May 5.
I’m disappointed but not surprised that there’s no official Motu Proprio news today. I would have been very surprised if Alice Von Hildebrand was the one who ended up having the inside track. Also, the comments of Bishop Fellay and Msgr. Schmitz, this past week, were like a punch in the stomach.
Fr. Bartoloma: Well… we are all wound pretty tight right now. We have waited for a long time. A little while longer won’t kill us.
For the record, I understood that AvH stated that she was told ‘May’, not specifically May 5th. The May 5th date was pious speculation. She could still be right.
I thank the Lord for the old mass in Amsterdam and i thank the FSSP for make it possible. But it’s very sad that so many people don’t have this and they are waiting on the MP. I spoke a Belgian friend and he was almost desperate. His father is 80 years old and wants the old mass very much. This man was crying because the Belgian prelate Danneels hates the old rite and he does everything to prevent it.
It’s all so very sad….
May 13th will be the 90th anniversary of the first Fatima apparition — would be the next best day for an announcement.
Theodoricus,
The whole thing is completely sad, all of it, from about 1962 onwards. We Catholics appear to spend a lot of time rationalizing our own self-induced demise. That’s what this entire period has been about. That and trying to fit into the mainstream and get all cosy, which is the real #1 goal of many Catholics.
Does the Pope read blogs? I suppose yes, once in a while. So he knows all these speculations and rumours.
I hope His Holiness is aware that his Papal Nuncio to the USA has just lit prayer lamps for a Hindu god in some kind of a pagan ceremony.
I hope and pray that the rejuvenation of virtue that will accompany the Motu Proprio will abolish unchristian ceremonies such as this.
God bless you.
All of this waiting in the midst of some pretty-sure indications that a M.P. is on the way has encouraged me to ask my bishop for permission to celebrate the old Mass under the present rules. It’s going to take some time to get all the pieces together here on the local level but the wheels are rolling already. Hang in there, everyone… even without the appearance of the MP, I dare say its impact is being felt. I would encourage other priests who are waiting for the MP to bite the bullet and simply take the initiative under the current rules and ask. You might be pleasantly suprised.
The biggest problem I anticipate is that I am in a place where my present responsibilities already have me trinating on a Sunday. This, I tend to think, is going to be the limiting factor for many otherwise-willing priests in embracing the celebration of the old Mass on a regular basis. That’s not an excuse, but an unfortunate fact of life that is going to really stretch people and parishes and priests until things get better. With what I am seeing of young priests and seminarians and youth, I do have firm hope that things will get better – not overnight or even perhaps in this decade, but certainly in the foreseeable future.
I am beyond worry.
I am in a place where my present responsibilities already have me trinating on a Sunday.
I know a priest who on a recent Sunday celebrated 4 Masses (including an indult) in 4 languages (English, Latin, Spanish) in 4 different churches, with about 200 miles of driving involved. The kind of priests the Church needs now.
With what I am seeing of young priests and seminarians and youth, I do have firm hope that things will get better.
Msgr. Michael Schmitz (ICKSP) was interviewed on EWTN radio last night. The second half-hour was questions phoned in. There had been some reference to lack of enthusiasm for the TLM among some priests and bishops. One of the first callers said he was a seminarian at “the Catholic seminary in Columbus, Ohio”. He said (perhaps paraphrasing slightly) “Let me assure you that that there is no lack of enthusiasm for the TLM among the seminarians here.” The kind of seminarians the Church needs now.
I assume the seminarian in question was from the Pontifical College Josephinum, which is in Columbus. I don’t know if the Diocese of Columbus has its own seminary.
In any case, I can certainly confirm that there is an enthusiasm for the traditional liturgy among a number of seminarians at the Josephinum, whose acquaintance I have made. Indeed, I would say that that’s fairly typical of seminarians and recently-ordained clergy.
I volunteer as an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion at the hospital –not something the priests do anymore–and even today I was saddened by the people I ran into who are not going to Mass because of the Mass itself and the condition of our liturgy. The older people have NOT gotten over the loss of the mass of their childhood. One lady was 90 years old and has not gone to mass in years. She had just moved from a diocese where one of my sisters live and my sister no longer goes to mass either in that very liberal diocese. And the lady lamented to me about how Mass is nowadays. And her daughter did too. And a dear older Irish man who I have encountered in the hospital before also said the same thing. These hearts HURT–even now, decades later.
And just in a general sense, the majority of those I encounter at the hospital and who register as Catholic are NOT coming to Mass. They do not understand about the Holy Euchaist and no one has preached it in years. They think it is fine to show up now and again to get another dose of ‘God loves you, carry on”. I cannot tell you the last time I heard the need to repent preached–have I heard it in my adult life? I went to the chapel and prayed and cried for these souls–they well may know no better. Our priests are gone so very much! Don’t they know the sheep are starving?
It is my fervent hope that the reclaiming of the Mass of the ages will make a difference over the years and that how we pray will affect how we believe and a return to the knowledge of the sacred will restore reverence and our knowledge that we are in need of mercy.
But thanks be to God for EWTN. Many of those older ones who do not go to the praise ourselves liturgy, watch Mass on TV.
Ave Maria!
[quote]I am in a place where my present responsibilities already have me trinating on a Sunday.
I know a priest who on a recent Sunday celebrated 4 Masses (including an indult) in 4 languages (English, Latin, Spanish) in 4 different churches, with about 200 miles of driving involved. The kind of priests the Church needs now.
With what I am seeing of young priests and seminarians and youth, I do have firm hope that things will get better.
Msgr. Michael Schmitz (ICKSP) was interviewed on EWTN radio last night. The second half-hour was questions phoned in. There had been some reference to lack of enthusiasm for the TLM among some priests and bishops. One of the first callers said he was a seminarian at “the Catholic seminary in Columbus, Ohioâ€. He said (perhaps paraphrasing slightly) “Let me assure you that that there is no lack of enthusiasm for the TLM among the seminarians here.†The kind of seminarians the Church needs now.[/quote]
Hey, that was me! I was supprised to actually get through. When the screening lady asked me what question I had I could only respond “uhhh, actually I’m not sure I didn’t expect to get through!”
And the seminary in question is indeed the Pontifical College Josephinum in Columbus Ohio.
Msgr. Schmitz told us at St. Mary’s that his Institute celebrates the Easter Vigil according to the rite as it stood before the revison of Pope Pius XII in 1955, though they celebrate them at night, not on Saturday morning.
His justification was: we have had cardinals present who have said nothing.
I confess I’m a bit uncomfortable about this. Any opinions?
That doesn’t surprise me. The Abbey of Fontgombault near Poitiers, France does something similar. Although their liturgy is based on the 1962 books, at High Mass, the celebrant is at his chair much more often than he is supposed to be. They’ve also inserted prayer ofthe faithful, sung in Latin facing east, and on SPECIAL occasions, they concelebrate, in which case the canon is chanted out loud. The Holy See is aware of all of this, and I’m guessing that since Cardinal Ratzinger hosted a liturgical conference there, that means he approves of what they’re doing. None of these changes are found in the Missal of 1962, but they’re all from Sacrosanctum Concilium. When liturgical adaptations are inspired by strong faith and are in accordance with liturgical tradition and not the fruits of modernism or relativism, the Holy See doesn’t seem to mind. This was their stance during the Middle Ages.
A very elderly Jesuit I once knew, who graciously celebrated a semi-private, as it were, Tridentine Mass for several of my friends and me in college, lived in France from 1952-1958.
He noted that there was not a general acceptance of the 1956 Holy Week; many locales continued using the pre-1956 Rite, with the 12 lessons, etc., though at the late night hour.
The case of the French monasteries…some of them at least…and their daughter monasteries…is different. The PCED did specifically approve some modifications for their conventual Masses.
Father:
Shouldn’t the fact that H.E. Cardinal Sodano was His Holiness’ personal representative be taken as worthwhile — it’s a bit like sending Fr. Holvenbach to the sweeping of the seminaries, isn’t it?