Msgr. Gherardini was one of our profs at the Pontifical Lateran University.
Check out this piece at One Peter Five, in which Gherardini’s thought about Tradition and the 1988 consecrations by Archbp. Lefevbre is briefly exposed.
[…]
I will not enter into the details of the relations and difficulties between the Holy See and the Society of Saint Pius X. I stick to the common theme of Tradition and I observe that “safeguard the faith and combat error” should be the ideal and commitment as much of the Church as of her sons. In the light of this, it is difficult for me to understand how the reproach of an “incomplete and contradictory Tradition” formulated by John Paul II in 1988, could have any real grounds. What I understand is that it has nothing to do with the ‘spirit of Assisi’.
[…]
A very nice article. I believe in “The Banished Heart” the author points out how the definition of tradition had changed during the 20th century.
I do not feel competent to address the general question of the meaning of ‘Tradition’, but I can comment on liturgy, and on what is said in the pieces linked in this post.
As a 12 year-old in 1950 I was taught that the Mass had two distinct parts – the Mass of Catechumens and the Mass of the Faithful (as taught by Aquinas, and in my view essential understanding for resolving the liturgy wars [Latin and Syro/Malabar]). I noted at some point the welcome given by Abp Lefebvre to the 1965 Missal – https://archive.ccwatershed.org/media/pdfs/21/12/09/09-35-37_0.pdf More recently I have seen the text of Aquinas – https://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2015/07/st-thomas-aquinass-early-commentary-on.html and its several references to the people present at Mass. It is evident to me that Abp Lefebvre was correct in his view that the 1965 reform was needed.
The seventh contrast,between VO & NO, made by Msgr. Gherardini is :-
“An expiatory Sacrifice of the Mass, that celebrates the mysteries of the passion, death and resurrection of Christ, sacramentally representing the satisfactory redemption, confronting a Mass in which the priest is only a president and everyone takes an “active” part in the sacrament, thanks to the fact that the faith is not founded on God Who reveals Himself, but is an existential response made to God Who interpolates us. ”
However deficient the performance (ars celebrandi) of an NO Mass may be it is clear from the words used that the, largely didactic, Liturgy of the Word (Mass of the Catechumens) over which the priest presides is followed by the sacrifice at the Mass of the Faithful [Pray brethren, that my sacrifice …] [May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands …]. And the transition between the two Masses (if I can express it so) is marked by the formal preparation of the altar, which is then used exclusively by the priest.
In contrast at Low Mass Aquinas ” instruction of the people is done through the word of God,” had become ineffective, particularly where the vernacular was not a romance language.