Here is some great news.
I was sent a translation of a sermon given by the new Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio, His Excellency Most Rev. Luigi Negri, on Pentecost at the Marian Shrine of Poggetto. The occasion was a celebration of Holy Mass with the 1962 Missale Romanum.
I share here the last part of the sermon (my emphases):
This grace which the Church gives, you are living it at the spring of the Faith: the celebration of Holy Mass. You are able to drink these waters thanks to the great mercy of Benedict XVI. You can drink from this fresh stream, using one of the Church’s great treasures: the traditional liturgy. This is not an alternative to the reformed liturgy brought in after Vatican II, but is a fuller, freer, and more responsible form to be lived alongside the other one. Benedict XVI said as much in his wonderful Motu Proprio.
He wanted to widen the richness of the Liturgy to the whole Church, and so he asked the Church – starting with the Bishops – to be more respectful of his desire to widen these riches to anyone who legitimately wanted so they could fully live the truth of the Faith for the mission of today through this “older” form. The Pope thus overcame that spurious distinction between “old” and “new” which is made by the followers of the hermeneutic of discontinuity between what happened before the Council and what happened after it, and what we see in today’s world which has caused so much fatigue.
There is only ONE Church, and She has lived through history thanks to the Holy Spirit. The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council was an extremely important moment in time, although that moment was one of great challenges for the Church.
You may use this liturgy, and I am extremely happy that you do so in this Archdiocese where I arrived only a few months ago. You do not do so to attack anyone, or to push any opinion, but rather to live the mystery of the Church in accordance with the depth and truth of your right to live this way. The Church has made all this possible. Benedict XVI – I am not someone who uses words because he likes the sound they make – Benedict XVI showed his pastoral mercy by allowing this for individual Catholics or small groups who need not have a precise legal size. These are the “small groups” of the faithful who have the right and the duty to be able to come to this Mass. [small and now growing]
Now you have it all in your hands, and the Church allows you to spread it freely.
[NB] There can be no-one, no Diocese in Italy or anywhere in the world, who can stop you doing this. If any Bishop ever dares to say “no” to you, he must be brought before an ecclesiastical tribunal immediately. [!!!!] But before anything like that happens, there must be dialogue among the faithful who want the older Liturgy, and between the faithful and any priest who wants to help you take part in this beautiful Mass. To do so requires a certain level of preparation, but I am sure you have this already! I think that for it to become an experience for all those who want it a period of training and preparation will be needed. I tried to implement the Motu Proprio in a small Diocese, in San Marino-Montefeltro, where reactions were generally not extreme. I wrote to our Holy Father to tell him about the situation, mostly because the Instruction on how to apply the Motu Proprio was to take another two years. I received a short letter from Benedict XVI, who spoke very positively about how the Traditional Latin Mass had been brought back to my Diocese without any tension.
Try this older Liturgy for yourselves! Try out the truths of your faith! Try out the truths of your charity! Give impetus to your mission! Be like those who try out the same truths with the reformed Liturgy in the truth of their Faith and charity: they are two treasures for the same people. [NB]People can be said to be grown-up Catholics if they understand these freedoms the Church gives them. Liturgical freedom is not something the Church merely gives: She guarantees it!
Do not hold on to any opinions you think you need to “defend” against others. The Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio is neither the keeper nor the propagator of any opinions. The Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio has only one opinion, the eternal truth of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the tradition of the Church, the teachings of the Holy Father, and the things he himself says when they are in line with the Pope. This is the space Benedict XVI has allowed us. I am one of the few bishops (I am afraid to say we are very few) to have gained from all this a deeper sense of our identity in our dealings with God. [The Italian bishops are not, as a body, on board with anything traditional. Odd, but that’s the way it goes.] It is truly a great thing; and not just for those who practise it, but for the whole Church.
[Watch this!] Let me sum up by saying that this is why you must try to get as many people as possible to walk down this path of yours. [Get that?] It will not take you away from the life of the Church, nor will it lighten the heavy burden of being in communion with them, although this is a wonderful thing.
[… He speaks then about recovering from the devastating earthquake….]
I shall always be close to you. I shall always encourage you. All I ask of you is that same humility which Pope Francis shows to the world in his words and actions, before he asks it of any of us. Have no other preoccupation than to live in the depths of your souls what the Church has given you for your own good and for the good of all. Remember that my support and help will never fail you. I offer you my correction too, as I do to every community that feels it needs such a thing, but I am sure I will never need to give you any!
READING FRANCIS THROUGH BENEDICT!
Fr. Z kudos to the Archbishop of Ferrara-Comacchio!
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Words chosen with care carry great power. I hope I am not in error in thinking that it appears that the translator has been careful to preserve the Archbishop’s intentions.
Negri for Cardinal, Cardinal Negri for Pope!
What great insights…
Those of us who attend the Extraordinary Form of the Mass have always had it in our
power to invite others to join us, to make them feel welcome, to answer their questions
as best we can, and to get out of the way while the Mass shows them its treasures.
Papable.
Clinton,
What you say is true, but rarely – in the last 50 years – have we had the encouragement of a bishop in the effort.
I’m not in Italy, but since we’re connected in the Mystical Body of Christ I don’t need to be to benefit from the good Archbishop’s words and actions: what heals the body has an affect far beyond the immediate environs of the actions or words. (Of course, what harms the body behaves the same way, and for the same reason.)
Be of good cheer. Make an ally of a bishop by praying for him — dare I say that those who love the older form should make a public spiritual bouquet ESPECIALLY for bishops who think of tradition as the enemy?
Since I discovered the traditional mass, I’ve been bringing family and friends, and trying to bring more people. It’s pretty sad when not only do you have to evangelize about the faith, but when you have to evangelize about something that has been around for 1600 years and for the past 40 years, has become like something that has never existed.
I think His Excellency warranst the Gold Star of the Day.
I want to print it out and memorize it, as an apologetic to those in my group , and my spiritual director, who voice their objections. It is so reasonable, so charitable, and covers all the fears that they put forth against the EF of the Mass.
Sandro Magister quotes one of the italian bishops on his recent ad limina visit with Pope Francis:
“.Poi è stata la volta del vescovo di Conversano e Monopoli, Domenico Padovano, il quale ha raccontato al proprio clero che i vescovi pugliesi si erano lamentati col papa per l’opera di divisione creata dentro la Chiesa dai paladini della messa in rito antico.
E che cosa avrebbe loro risposto il papa?
Stando a quanto riferito da monsignor Padovano, Francesco li avrebbe esortati a vigilare sugli estremismi di certi gruppi tradizionalisti, ma anche a fare tesoro della tradizione e a farla convivere nella Chiesa con l’innovazione.
Per spiegare meglio quest’ultimo punto, il papa avrebbe portato il proprio esempio:
“Vedete? Dicono che il mio maestro delle cerimonie papali [Guido Marini] sia di stampo tradizionalista; ed in molti, dopo la mia elezione, mi hanno invitato a sollevarlo dall’incarico e sostituirlo. Ho risposto di no, proprio perché io stesso possa fare tesoro della sua preparazione tradizionale e contemporaneamente egli possa avvantaggiarsi, allo stesso modo, della mia formazione più emancipata”.
http://magister.blogautore.espresso.repubblica.it/2013/05/25/tra-confidenze-ed-esorcismi-un-papa-tutto-da-decifrare/
The trouble with the New Mass liturgy introduced after Vat II is that it is no longer one liturgy but rather endless “liturgies”, so variable and chaotic are the many differences that have crept into, or been deliberately introduced.
While in Spain recently, I watched the priest heroically trying to re-introduce elements of the traditional Mass as a way of pulling his disparate European congregation together. We had to practice the Kyrie and Agnus Dei. And it worked!
In other churches I have observed, visitors have just been excluded by the vernacular and the endless variations in the rubrics found today.
We must get back to the Tridentine Mass, or at least a Reform of the Reform, if the Church is to be prevented from disintegrating.
The Holy Ghost works wonders! This was just what I needed to hear as my heart was growing weary. Will be sharing this with several people I know who have shown interest but so far have been unsuccessful in getting the parish counsel on board. I think priests are willing if we ask but the faithful must be courageous enough to work for it.
Very nice indeed! Between things like this (because this bishop doesn’t sound myopic, focused entirely on his own liturgical purity, but instead sounds quite evangelical!) and the Pope’s statement the other day, I think things could take a turn for the better.
I just wish they’d go back to the old office and the old calendar. The liturgy has been politicized and made a subject of contention by the left, and I don’t think there’s much chance of going back to it. But if only we could get back some of other riches that Vatican II destroyed…
But those who celebrate the old Mass should make it as spectacular as possible in hopes of attracting people. Wherever the Spanish landed in the New World, they always had a dramatic and splendid Mass upon landing, in good part to impress the native peoples and make them think there might be something to this new religion. The Franciscans in the New World also loved drama, liturgical ornament and music because it was so effective in conversions.
I know the Priest who was Celebrant at this Mass, and I don’t want to bore people with the details of all the graces he told me he has received after saying this Mass (his first Solemn Mass and the first Solemn Mass in his Diocese for almost fifty years), but worshippers at that Shrine are now raising funds to put the altar back in its right place via a sponsored Rosary March, they want to start learning Gregorian Chant and have sung Vespers every Sunday and so on and so on. It was all filmed and will be broadcast on Italian state TV, then a DVD will be made and proceeds from the sale will go to reconstruction work at his Parish church, damaged during the earthquake Archbishop Negri spoke about. All this after ONE MASS!
Rorate notes that on Trinity Sunday, Francis gave Communion to laypersons who were standing rather than following Benedict’s custom of requiring communicants to kneel.
“Sunday’s papal Mass at the parish of “Santi Elisabetta e Zaccaria,” the Pope’s first pastoral visit to a Roman parish outside of the Vatican itself, saw the Pope give first communion to several children (and at least one adult). The full video of the Mass can be found here, with the communion of the children taking place starting at 1:49:15.
He gave communion to the children (and the adult) while they stood, and he also did so without a paten (even though he would first intinct the host in the Precious Blood). It is quite clear from footage and photographs of the Mass that there was more than enough space for a kneeler to have been put in front of the Pope and, surely, procuring a kneeler and a paten would not have been impossible in a Roman parish for a papal Mass!
To those tempted to dismiss the significance of this action: consider that this took place in the Pope’s first Mass in a parish of his diocese outside the Vatican, in a Mass that was broadcast live by Centro Televisivo Vaticano and which took place not on an ordinary weekday or a “green Sunday,” but on one of the great feasts of the liturgical year. Furthermore, precisely because it took place in a parish of his own diocese, it cannot but send a clear signal about what he sees as appropriate for the liturgy in a typical parish.
(As an aside, the so-called “Benedictine altar arrangement” was also reduced in this Mass to two small candles and a small crucifix in the middle of the altar.)
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2013/05/trinity-sundays-papal-mass-liturgical.html
May God Bless this Archbishop. Would that there be many more like him. Alas. such is not the case.
Pray. pray, pray.
Watching the video of Francis distributing first Communion on Trinity Sunday, you can see that he has reversed the arrangement described in the GIRM. He is holding the chalice and the deacon is holding the ciborium rather than vice-versa.
This seems to work better than the GIRM procedure – with less chance of the Sacred Blood dripping from the intincted host.
jhayes, I don’t understand how your comments are related to the subject of Fr. Z’s post, which is the TLM/EF and S.P.
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(As an aside, the so-called “Benedictine altar arrangement” was also reduced in this Mass to two small candles and a small crucifix in the middle of the altar.) jhayes
I think it’s good to see the arrangement toned down; it seems much less distracting to me.
I don’t think the unreformed mass will take off in any kind of numbers until it is presided over by a Bishop of Rome, and I don’t see that happening any time soon.
I hate the term “unreformed mass”. Typical Praytell vocabulary. What is it supposed to mean?
MD, pretty self-explanatory methinks.
Clearly S.C. intended to reform the liturgy; S.C. implementation was post-1962 so obviously the 1962 version is unreformed. Simple.
And because of the “reformed” Mass of 1970 (only 40 years young), Catholics no longer know what the Catholic faith believes and teaches, no longer attend Mass on Sundays, don’t understand what mortal sin is, don’t understand what the Holy Eucharist is . . . . I could go on.
Lex credendi, Lex orandi.
I’m not sure why one would want to tone down the Benedictine altar arrangement. Six candles and a crucifix had been the normal altar arrangement for centuries upon centuries, correct? That arrangement ties together the old with the new or the EF with the OF so I prefer it stay.
Regardless, it’s correct to say those of us under 40 have only seen the reformed Mass and many simply don’t bother to go anymore. TLM and a return to tradition may not be an answer to that problem, but I definitely believe the dignified reverence the TLM offers would entice some, who feel the current form is lacking, to return. Maybe I’m wrong, though.
These numbers might not be precise, but in 1962 a bit more than 75% of Americans Catholic attended Mass weekly. By 2002, before the abuse scandal broke, that number was down to a little less than 25%. Maybe that drop was always going to happen, but it did coincide with the upheaval caused by VCII and the reform of the Mass.
“I think it’s good to see the arrangement toned down; it seems much less distracting to me.”
What is distracting?
acardinal, do you mean 1973?
And I guess you are assuming that nothing at all was happening in society in the ’60’s and ’79’s except what was happening in the Catholic Church?
Robbie, also, there were huge quantum changes going on in society at all levels in the latter half of the 20th Century; it’s not all about the church.
Personally I don’t think the most effective way of addressing the massive sea change in society, finance, science, culture, arts, geopolitics, environment, technology, connectivity, medicine, etc., is by pretending that it’s 1950 all over again.
Fr. Jim,
I agree with you completely. It’s so much better now than it was before the Council. I can’t stand the Benedictine arrangement either. It distracts the priest and the people as they try to worship. My favorite part of Mass is when I can make eye contact with the priest – it gives you the warm and fuzzies so that you know the Spirit is really present.
Hey, JLM, I thought that was you! When are you going to register in the parish? Just call the office and we can do it by phone. Fr. Jim.
Father Jim, post hoc is a fallacy, but there’s a reason it’s so popular.
Fr. Jim,
Would love to! What is the name and location of your parish?
Sure just post your phone number here and I’ll give you a call.
frjim4321 said: “I don’t think the unreformed mass will take off in any kind of numbers until it is presided over by a Bishop of Rome, and I don’t see that happening any time soon.”
The timeless Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the Extraordinary Form is “taking off.”
In my area we have over 8 locations where the “most beautiful Mass this side of heaven” is offered and is growing. Just this past Sunday I attended another one about an hour away. The church was full. Yes, full. Over 95% of the women wore head coverings, all men and women were dressed in respectful “Sunday best”, and there was a beautiful silence and holy reserve on the part of everyone. which of course is very common at any EF. No one seemed the least bit “distracted”. Quite the opposite. After Father processed out, everyone stayed seated for a few minutes before gradually and silently leaving for pleasant fellowship outside the church proper.
frjim’s word “unreformed” seems to apply more to the fruit or lack thereof from the NO. We all know the statistics don’t we.
I am dying laughing here – I think jlmorrell needs a gold star.
Fr. Jim said, “And I guess you are assuming that nothing at all was happening in society in the ’60?s and ’79?s except what was happening in the Catholic Church?”
Ever hear the saying, “As The Church goes, so goes the world”?
The church has always changed the world, that is until the church let the world in and followed the world. The disastrous results speak for themselves. Scoreboard wins.
Regarding six candles on the altar, they are not there primarily to embellish the altar. Until 90 or 100 yers ago there was no electric light, which we tend to forget.
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Holy cow, this blew my socks off! Legisperitus beat me to it, and I was going to say “Papa subito!” (After all, one not need to be a cardinal to be a papabile). But I must show some constraint in deference to our present Holy Father, whose work has just begun, and who can (will) do a lot for the Church.
frjim4321 says:
Personally I don’t think the most effective way of addressing the massive sea change in society, finance, science, culture, arts, geopolitics, environment, technology, connectivity, medicine, etc., is by pretending that it’s 1950 all over again.
As I’ve told you more than once, the approach you endorse has been proven a failure.
And it would be nice if you could come up with an argument other than warmed over 1975 liberal clichés
Verbum sapientae Archbishop Negri – wise words. What we need the most is to attract more faithful to the EF mass. We are still few even though America leads the way.
I agree that the more sung masses we have a very positive effect. The sung mass is much more attracive for our brethren that had to endure through the VC2 reformation.
Farther Jim4321 is a good example of the meanness of the VC2 Reformation, and why we should not have a VC3 for many decades.
It is quite true that those who love the traditions of the Church, especially the TLM are (as many have) going to have to pray and fight hard. We have to understand we are going up against not only the “Spirit of Vatican II, but also many years of the deconstruction of the Holy Mass. Men like Annibale Bugnini had been itching for years to radically change the Mass and Vatican II provided that opportunity. The mindset of many in the Church is the rubrics of the TLM and the s are an impediment to ‘full participation’ by the faithful and the New Mass is closer to the practice of the Early Church. The fight against the Nouvelle Theologie is similar in some aspects to Athanasius’ struggle against Arianism.
Thank you Archbishop Negri!
This is how we should approach bringing others to the riches of tradition. Tradition is not a club or a gang where we try and get as many people to join as possible, but a rich resource which will help anyone who taps into it to draw closer to God. Who can resist this? Who can argue? Every person who has been blessed to know tradition should take these words to heart, and try and imitate them when speaking to others about tradition.
Added to that, most people will react well to someone who is offering them a good true and beautiful manner of coming closer to Christ, as Archbishop Negri does here. Most people will take a free gift. If we make the treasures of the faith inviting and attractive then people will be invited and attracted to it. Most people who come to Mass would react well to this kind of free invitation to something beautiful. The liberal nutjobs who hate the Extraordinary form are very much in the minority, even if they seem to hold the power in parish life.
I am not sure if anyone had mentioned this before… Way off topic…. But father…. Why is there a need to read one pontiff through another? John XXIII was not read through Pivs XII and I am sure there was no need for a push towards “continuity” as at least I am sure all the Popes affirm everything said before, Right? Just curious. I would have thought that each pontiff needs to be looked at on face value yes? I am sure if we read Alexander VI in view of the other pontiffs and the historical period…. He would come off favourably? I just say it as every time I log on to your blog I see that phrase every time. That being said; viva il papa! Well, both of them ;)
As to Fr. Jim’s comments that the Extraordinary Form needs to be said by the Pope in order for it to take off, while that would be a boost if it happened, it is not necessary. Unlike the 1970’s “reform” of the Mass under Pope Paul VI, which was imposed top-down on the faithful, this is a grass roots phenomenon, mostly brought about by dozens of hard working groups of priests and lay people, often with the indifference or even hostility of the hierarchy. My guess is that it will only be performed by the Holy Father when it becomes too widespread to be ignored any more, by which time his affirmation will no longer be necessary to encourage it.
FrJim4321 says,
Clearly S.C. intended to reform the liturgy
Obviously true, but there is no indication that SC called for:
1. The promulgation of a new rite
2. Eucharistic celebration facing the people
3. The complete vernacularization of the liturgy
frjim4321
Robbie, also, there were huge quantum changes going on in society at all levels in the latter half of the 20th Century; it’s not all about the church.
You’re absolutely right. Thankfully, I didn’t have to live those decades!
The last unfortunate “reform” of the liturgy happened at a time in which the people who were supposed to be guarding the hen house of liturgical tradition were modernist foxes high on their fantasies about what late 2nd century liturgy was supposed to be like through the lense of “modern man” (insert other buzzword nonsense for a different flavor) . Read any of the excellent books put out in recent years about the travesty of a “reform” foisted upon the Roman Rite, which as such in its recent permutation would be better called (kudos to Laszlo) the Neo-Roman Rite.
One little aside, the “Benedictine Arrangement” was a hat tip in the direction of the Tridentine “Big Six”-an attempt to preserve some visual continuity with the pre-conciliar cultural memory of what churchware is supposed to look like. It fails mainly because facing the people with the intention to actually face them is just silly and untraditional and no amount of window dressing will turn that sow’s ear into a silk purse. The “big six” isn’t some sort of apostolic tradition, but it is a very clear link to the past and a settled into norm. Any two-bit Collegeville trained liturgy apparatchik could chime in with pseudo-scholarly aplomb at this point that two candles and a cross would be more “traditional”, after all, this was the way the Sarum usage had the altar set up…etc. etc. This is how the Modernist thinks, there is a truly traditional connection to a different number of candles than the Tridentine “big six” but when said Modernist shows me a NO that looks like a Sarum Rite celebration one should not be amused with their pedantry. Any shred of “tradition” is used as an excuse for all manner of untraditional travesties or just plain silliness.
Kudos to this bishop for having a spine and telling it like it should be, especially about taking his unfaithful confreres before a tribunal. Why we collectively committed sepuku as a Church in regards to our Tradition and evangelical zeal for conversion is beyond me, but bishops like this show us that the Church is far from vanguished by the Enemy.
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Robbie says:
frjim4321
Robbie, also, there were huge quantum changes going on in society at all levels in the latter half of the 20th Century; it’s not all about the church.
You’re absolutely right. Thankfully, I didn’t have to live those decades!
I did, and the changes, which were indeed huge and unsettling for many, made Latin more important than ever because it gave people a sense of the transcendent (i.e., not subject to a particular time and place) that kept them from drowning in change. Unfortunately, the inculturation freaks opposed Latin, promising that vernacularization would produce a wonderful renewal of the Church, a New Pentecost. When life in the Church collapsed rather than flowered, they bemoaned that secular culture’s disorders had found their way into the Church.
frjim4321 wrote, “acardinal, do you mean 1973?”
No. I mean 1970.
Pope Paul VI ordered the revision the the missal when he promulgated the “Apostolic Constitution Missale Romanum” on April 3, 1969 and it became effective November 30, of 1969 according to the same document. But the initial publication of the Paul VI Novus Ordo Missae did not appear until 1970. This missal was the official beginning of the “Protestantization” of the Holy Mass.
Clearly S.C. intended to reform the liturgy…
It is explicitly clear that S.C. called for Latin and for Gregorian chant to remain the preferred forms for liturgy and music. What is explicitly not called for in S.C. includes:
– rotating the altar
– replacing altars with plywood tables
– replacing beautiful and reverential hymns with banal sing-song
– bowing (often perfunctorily) in preference to genuflecting
– receiving standing and in the hand
– EMHCs
– piano, guitars and drums
– applause
– “liturgical dance”
Need I continue? Almost everything done in the wake and name of the Council would have been appalling only a short time earlier. And pleasing to Satan.
This is profoundly beautiful. God bless Archbishop Negri!
(And God bless Fr. Z, too, of course!)
Right–and the restoration of the TLM can be done WITHIN the Church and not by forming another denomination like SSPX or SSPV.
“The changes, which were indeed huge and unsettling for many, made Latin more important than ever because it gave people a sense of the transcendent (i.e., not subject to a particular time and place) that kept them from drowning in change. Unfortunately, the inculturation freaks opposed Latin, promising that vernacularization would produce a wonderful renewal of the Church, a New Pentecost.”
The medium is indeed the message. And we remain “drowning in change.”
The restoration of the liturgy (praying the Mass, the divine office, chant, etc.) can be accomplished ONLY from within the Church. It is next to useless to stand outside, jumping up and down, if no one can hear you.
It seems to me that the following would go a long way in not only restoring tradition but also taking into account modernity (not modernism) for the sake of 21st century enculturation in America:
1. Near-1962 mass in English as the norm (with minor revisions to shorten the Mass as called for by S.C. and obvious usage of some Latin and Greek where appropriate). We need the traditional Mass and all of its glory available to those who view Latin as an obstacle. We have to meet people where they are. Latin has been forgotten, and thus is not really useful as a tool for re-evangelizing our churches-which must come before re-evangelizing our nation, IMO.
2. Restoration of minor orders (acolyte, lector etc) with some provisio for females to serve, along with a serious and in-depth theological basis given for not viewing the recipients of these as receiving the Sacrament of Holy Orders. In short, give people a more reverent and traditional way for both males and females to serve during the liturgy than “reader” (boring) or EMHC (annoying). Cassocks and surplices only — no sloppy albs. The sanctuary must appear holy–then we will see it being treated holy.
3. Promotion of a parish choirs and the idea of having a paid choir director, with an emphasis on Mass propers as well as learning new (and re-learning the old), appropriate ROYALTY-FREE music composed by artists who are not part of the joint Catholic/Protestant copyright cabal that developed after the council and still wrecks our liturgy regardless of which translations of the texts we use.
4. Nationwide instruction via the Baltimore Catechism at a bare minimum. Everything else in terms of formation, regardless of how good and helpful it may be, comes AFTER proficiency in the B.C. Could even come out with an updated version with a few modernizations to appease those who view the B.C. with shock and horror.
5. Restoration of the “old” order of the sacraments of initiation with an elimination of the idea of Confirmation as a “rite of passage” for adolescents. No more “graduation” parties after Confirmation, no more telling the child “you are old enough to choose your own path.” It is is NOT true freedom or responsibility when we tell our children that they may licitly choose to leave the Catholic Church. It is potentially the damnation of their souls and it is definitely shooting ourselves in the foot.
6. And I’m serious about this one: processions in the public street with the Sacrament and with statues of Our Lady. We must, absolutely must, take our faith to the streets. The liberals have taken our churches from us and they have taken our parishioners from us. We must go get them back. We just have to do 1-5 first so that we have something to bring them back to.
I am truly convinced that the TLM is the only hope for the renewal and preservation of the Church. Without it, the Church will end up without parishes, priests, people….
All right, enough substance! Can someone tell me what the archbishop is wearing? It appears to be a fiddleback on top of a gothic chasuble. Does that strike anyone as strange?