I saw the quote on twitter, but it was without a citation. I did some digging:
“For fostering a true consciousness in liturgical matters, it is also important that the proscription against the form of liturgy in valid use up to 1970 [the older Latin Mass] should be lifted. Anyone who nowadays advocates the continuing existence of this liturgy or takes part in it is treated like a leper; all tolerance ends here. There has never been anything like this in history; in doing this we are despising and proscribing the Church’s whole past. How can one trust her at present if things are that way?”
Joseph Ratzinger, God and the World: A Conversation with Peter Seewald (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2002), p. 416.
This is precisely right.
However, there are bishops who do despise the Church’s whole past. They want the past erased and buried. They want a new morality, especially. That way they can be popular.
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The Twilight Zone, “It’s a Good Life.”
Thank you, Rod Serling.
https://youtu.be/pdlAByWPmlk?feature=shared
I see an analogy here.
Someone has power over the whole family.
But he lacks the wisdom to use it well
Who is the drunk uncle?
“A very bad man, who keeps thinking bad thoughts about me.”
He will be punished.
Amen.
There is, certainly in the “West” (e.g. what was formerly known as Christendom + Canada and the US) a slew of Bishops who seem to be driving toward revolution. Yet, first and foremost, Christ calls us to charity. Certainly, charity does not mean rolling over and playing dead, yet for us laity it can at times be difficult to balance proper respect for the role and authority of our Bishops and “pushing back.” In a world of clickbait, memes, quotes (usually out of context), and more, I think it is critical for us to be prudent and patient, and above all pray and fast for ALL our Priests, and most especially for the ones that we perceive are hurting and scandalizing Holy Mother Church.
Thank you for posting this and thank you especially for pointing out “They want a new morality, especially.”
Because we found recently trained Episcopalian clergy were more interested in social work than the Gospel, in the late ‘60’s my mother allowed us to stop going to church. Finally, I began going to Church again in 1977 and found that there was a new “experimental” liturgy. But this simply meant that I was going back to a different church with, when push came to shove, different beliefs. It did not help.
This is why I sought out a TLM when I finally decided to become Catholic.
If anyone is following what happened to the United Methodist church, their recent history is instructive. According to what I read at Juicy Ecumenism the UMC in 2012 could be divided between liberals, moderates and conservatives. I gather that the main difference between moderates and liberals tended to be church teaching on sexual morality, particularly on the part of the clergy. Be that as it may, the revision of their liturgy was harmful beginning in the 1970’s, but the collapse began when the moderates decided to support liberal candidates for leadership positions. The moderates were quickly betrayed and teaching on sexual morality collapsed.
To me we could describe moderate Catholics as those holding traditional views on morality but who also like the alternative NO Eucharistic prayers and think of Traditional Catholics as lacking humility. (Yes I heard that on EWTN, a guy with a radio show accuses other people of lacking humility.) But if our moderates don’t support those of us who want the VO, the liberals will eventually betray them as well.
“…Anyone who nowadays advocates the continuing existence of this liturgy or takes part in it is treated like a leper; all tolerance ends here. There has never been anything like this in history; in doing this we are despising and proscribing the Church’s whole past. How can one trust her at present if things are that way?”
Ironic, coming from (then) Ratzinger, a prelate so deeply invested in the shaping of the documents and implementation of Vatican II. He obviously came to change his views as Cardinal and then as pope. Summorum Pontificum was certainly a gift. Thank you, Holy Father, for instituting it. It did much good.
But to say that “there has never been anything like this in history” is a laugh. Talk to the priests and laity who were forbidden from the TLM after Vatican II. HALF OF PARIS ALONE just stopped going to Mass at all after the Novus Ordo was shoved down the throats of the faithful back in the day. Vocations fell off a cliff; churches were whitewashed; iconoclasm ran rampant. But “nothing like this has ever happened in history?” That’s selective memory.
A number of commentators recently have floated the idea of a “compromise,” i.e., the Latin Novus Ordo with some/all of the “smells and bells” of the TLM. Apparently, there are a few places where this approach is a mandatory one-Sunday-per-month substitute… with claims that the TLM regulars accept it. And, if true, that’s tragic. The problem is not with the gussied-up Novus Ordo per se. It’s fine if that’s your thing. Rather, the problem is that it’s a dangerous divide-and-conquer strategy with respect to the TLM. As the saintly Ratzinger explained, the fundamental problem is the proscription of the Church’s entire past. And that must be rejected. Period. As the as-seen-on-TV ad campaigns of the past used to command, “Accept no substitute!”
“ How can one trust her at present if things are that way?” On at least the sociological level, aren’t we tradition-minded Catholics just referring back to an earlier magisterium: Trent, Roman Catechism, Catechism of Pius X, Ludwig Ott, etc.? Oh, wait, isn’t that what my Orthodox (in communion with Rome or not) friends are doing, but just to an earlier body of teaching, like the Seven Ecumenical Councils and the like? Or even, perhaps, for that matter, my Anglican friends who try to be little “o” orthodox, referring to the 39 Articles, the older versions of the BCP, etc.
Mary Ann Kreitzer wrote this today on her blog:
“When I think of all the saints formed by the faith taught for so many centuries with, not just the TLM, but with all the traditional sacraments of the Church, I can’t help but mourn. So many traditions: the Angelus, the Ember Days, the feasts and ferria described in my Benedictus – all lost to most Catholics. And what has replaced them? Very little. We have a stripped down liturgy, a stripped down sanctuary, stripped down sacraments, stripped down catechesis. And our shepherds tell us with straight faces it is to foster unity. Unity with whom? It’s pretty clear from the fall into syncretism that it is fostering unity with the world which is ruled, not by the Prince of Peace, but by Lucifer.
Do they really think we believe the charade that all this spiritual abuse is to foster unity? They preach that all other religions are a path to salvation… except for those who worship according to the faith of our fathers for over fifteen hundred years? ”
That last question sums it up. Everyone is welcome but those who want the age old TLM. That reveals what it’s all about doesn’t it? There’s no dialogue or walking together is there? No round tables on how can we foster unity in our parish or diocese with those who attend the TLM? But you sure can count on our bishops to host various “religious” leaders in a spirit of commonality.
When I was 10 in 1970 the nun teaching my CCD class asked us what would we do if our parish separated from the Pope. I admit I wasn’t sure what she was getting at. Years later my mother told me that around that time that she and dad had discussed what they were going to do and determined to stick with the Church Jesus founded and lead by St. Peter in Rome. Mom would say stick with Rome (meaning the Pope and the Catholic church).
That has always been my guiding principle. An easy answer.
As Mrs. Kreitzer points out saints were formed by 1500 years of TLM and many devotions. I wonder how can we have the same when we’re offered less in a spirit of unity, synodality, and ecumenism? Are we fortifying faithful willing to suffer and perhaps die for the Faith?
Somehow, going over to the local church that says “Catholic” on its big sign but
eschews things holy and looks no different than any protestant or secular memorial service just doesn’t cut it any more for a faithful Catholic who believes in the teachings of the Church and wants to get to heaven to be with God.
We have gotten in the habit of despising the Church’s whole past in order to fit in with modern society. We give the Mea Culpa for the Crusades and the Inquisition where none ought to be necessary, but the events should be rigorously defended. We let our children be tought that these were black marks on Christianity as a whole and the Catholic Church in particular, when they were actually long-withheld acts of mercy that prevented greater calamities like Civil War and further Muslim depredations of Christian lands.
We have allowed Protestant retellings of history to paint the Dark Ages as the fault of the Catholic Church, rather than the effect of Muslim conquest of the Mediteranean, North Africa, and parts of Europe, resulting in economic collapse.
It was only the Catholic Church that saved Europe from being Conquered by the Ottoman Turks.
The principles that the Framers of the Constitution based their laws on are Catholic in origin.
The Catholic Church abolished slavery in the west, championed the Scientific Method, preserved the knowledge of the Ancients, invented the University, the Hospital, and the Orphanage.
Western Civilization is Catholic Civilization, and it’s high time we take it back.
The problem with the “Latin Novus Ordo with smells and bells” as a compromise as mentioned above by @summorumpontificum777 is that it doesn’t address what traditional Catholics attend the TLM for which is the Liturgy itself that truly emphasizes it as a re-presentation of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross. After all I’d be willing to bet that there are more Low masses offered than there are High and that is what a large percentage of not the majority of traditional Catholics are attending. The idea that all we want is ad orientem and some incense and we will be happy is actually insulting.
The pernicious enemy here is Modernism. Paul VI was the last pope to be crowned; the papal tiara (that fun thing that looks like a beehive) is probably gathering dust in one of the Vatican museums somewhere. Why don’t popes want to be crowned any longer?
Prelates also do not take Pius X’s Oath Against Modernism any more — they haven’t in years. As a result, the Church is now synonymous with NGOs, banking, recycling, rainbow stuff, nicety, ineffectual leadership, soft fuzzies and immigration… which is a teeth-skin-thin veneer for what they’re actually covering up, I’m afraid.
Our Lady of Fatima, ora pro nobis!
I mentioned the other day that Pope Benedict really was uniquely qualified to address the question of a juridically-defined place and status for the TLM in the post-conciliar Church due to his particular experience and expertise. The desire for the Mass persisted into the 80’s despite the bishops reporting that “the problem [sic] of the Tridentine Mass is almost solved” but +JP2 did not really understand the question in-depth. Nonetheless he recognized that something had gone wrong with the implementation of the Council and he also seems to have seen the issue as one of equity. As such, he went as far as he dared in 1988, by personally asking bishops to implement the 1984 indult “wide[ly] and generous[ly]”, but this was insufficient and also failed to address the growing problem of “independent” chapels and clerici vagi whose acephalous status was due to the desire to retain the TLM. It was as foolish as it was cruel for Pope Francis to demolish his predecessor’s wise solution – which was working – since it did nothing to improve the situation and in fact provoked a crisis in the Church. I believe that – given the fact that we live in the real world and can’t simply run a “what if” scenario – we must do all we can to advocate for a revival of Summorum Pontificum as the best starting point from which to move forward. There truly hasn’t ever been anything like this in history, wherein those who desired access to an orthodox liturgical form which had shaped and dominated the life of Christianity for the minority of its history were indeed treated as LEPERS!
Every time I read about another bishop suppressing the TLM I get very angry and ask why is this man a bishop? There are so many bad shepherds in the Church- it’s very discouraging. I remember when my son went off to Georgetown-why did I pay them 250K over 4 yrs??- he and his buddies (KOC) wanted the TLM celebrated on campus- they were told to petition the Archbishop of DC- between the university and the Archbishop’s office they were hamstrung, put off, etc….. I think they might even have petitioned the Vatican. Well, they found a Jesuit at GU (a good loyal one) to celebrate the TLM in Dahlgren Chapel, where they would rotate the altar table to accommodate the Mass. Persistence is a virtue- Our bishops are handing out stones when the faithful ask for bread and worse, giving us snakes when we ask for fish-
There seems to be an idea, among both friends and foes of the Latin Mass, that the use of the Latin language, Gregorian chant, incense, ad orientem worship, reception of Holy Communion on the tongue, and other traditional practices, is somehow “adding” foreign things to the 1970 Order of Mass. That these are attempts to “gussy up” the Novus Ordo Mass, by imposing something that doesn’t really belong there.
But these things belong there. They are are still proper to the celebration of Mass.
The bishops at the Second Vatican Council did not intend to exclude them. They never envisioned many of the drastic changes that occurred in practice after the council was over. Much less did they intend a general loss of reverence, nor liturgical abuse by disregarding the rubrics.
One may desire the “Vetus” over the “Novus” for any number of good reasons. But celebrating the Novus Ordo Mass as set forth in the actual documents is not a “hybrid” form of Mass. It is, and should be, normal.
Re: the “gussied up” Novus Ordo. De jure, amenamen’s take is correct. De facto, amenamen’s take is not correct. If, in practice, ad orientem Novi Ordines in Latin with Gregorian chant, incense, Communion on the tongue, etc. are only slightly less rare than unicorns, then it’s silly to say that the gussied up N.O. “is normal.” Should be normal? Fine, good luck with that. It’s impossible not to notice that the most strident episcopal opponents of the TLM are the very same ones who punish priests who try to implement ad orientem worship, Communion rails, etc. If the same bishop who’s prohibiting kneeling for Communion in his diocese is trying to swap in a gussied up N.O. for the TLM, it’s not because he thinks the gussied up N.O. is proper worship. Rather, it’s simply a divide-and-conquer strategy to kill the TLM.
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