What the Council Fathers intended about Latin. v. What we got.
Peter K links to a piece at NLM:
Fr. Gabriel Díaz-Patri, researching the debates at Vatican II on Latin in the liturgy, demonstrates that the Council Fathers were told by the official relator that they were voting for the following:
1. Latin *must* be kept in the liturgy; this is not optional.
2. A liturgy… pic.twitter.com/u8G3q7aCM8
— Peter Kwasniewski (@DrKwasniewski) May 28, 2024
The Lie That Was Told to Over 2,000 Council Fathers at Vatican II
[…]
Some Council Fathers were worried about the loopholes. But the relator, that is, the rapporteur tasked with speaking to the assembly on behalf of the committee working on the document, reassured them that total vernacularization was out of the question.
[…]
The Latin Mass and the Intellectuals: Petitions to Save the Ancient Mass from 1966 to 2007
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The last judgement is going to be surreal. What a glorious moment when all darkness will be brought to the light. So many people have been robbed of their sacred patrimony.
Alas that the Council Fathers believed the relator. Perhaps the Council Fathers just assumed that authority could be trusted. Different times. The difficulties which the Church has faced since the 1960s have some silver linings, one of which is that the masks of many have slipped.
In the NLM article, several bishop’s requests are provided in Latin then translated. When asked about use of the vernacular, all of the bishops listed wanted the Roman Canon to remain in Latin.
What amazes me, too, is that they were fluent in Latin.
Not all the bishops were fluent in Latin. I have read that some of the US bishops spoke it so badly that the simultaneous translation providers switched to translating their speeches into Latin. And one suspects that some of them if they laughed did so because they already were plotting to destroy Latin. Shehan in Baltimore issued a ban on any use of Latin in 1967!
So, I absolutely love attending mass according to the 1962 Missal. But since I’ve just been informed that it exists (I confess I am not a theological expert), I would be curious as to how a “reverent NO” would compare to the 1965 Missal.
Maybe it’s true that some of the people writing the document – and the relator – didn’t actually intend what they were claiming. That does nothing at all to explain why Paul VI established the commission with know dissidents and heretics, and his approving their end product even though it unambiguously defied the Council’s own document. Or Paul’s doing nothing at all to rein in the vast abuses that went far beyond the changes that were authorized. Why he caved in to approving communion in the hand after dissidents disobediently started authorizing it, instead of punishing them as he should have. Nor why JPII didn’t reverse course on the excesses and abuses when he had the chance. Or why he caved in approving girl altar boys after dissidents disobediently pushed that, instead of taking names and punishing them. (And allowing an idiotic “interpretation” of his 1983 canon law on the point, instead of insisting on tradition and (if necessary) changing the canon to clarify the truth.)