by
Thomas A. Droleskey
This little-read and much scorned, much castigated website has contained a number of articles in the past four years dealing with the "better mousetrap" that has been and will continue to be the so-called "papal" motu proprio by the title of Summorum Pontificum, which was issued on July 7, 2007. The very first such article included the following passage that is relevant once again in light of the agitated concerns, found principally on the RORATE CÆLI blogspot, about a possible new and "improved" "papal" motu proprio that might be used to restrict the "rights" established in Summorum Pontificum for access to the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition that was promulgated by Angelo Roncalli/John XXIII in 1961 (and modified in 1962 with the insertion of the name of Saint Joseph in the Roman Canon) and is being modernized in many places with various rubrical changes (altar girls, reception of what purports to be Holy Communion on the hand, use of "Eucharistic ministers," the change in the Prayer for the Jews in the Good Friday service, the eventual incorporation of prefaces from the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service and the "celebration" of the feasts of those "canonized" by the conciliar "pontiffs). Here is what I wrote on July 7, 2007, that has relevance once again:
No amount of argumentation is going to convince anyone that Summorum Pontificum is a trap to lead people into the Novus Ordo, that it has many pitfalls on a practical level and is designed of its nefarious nature to produce a synthesis between the "two forms" of the "one" Roman Rite. Summorum Pontificum and the accompanying letter by Father Joseph Ratzinger to the world's conciliar bishops contain one gratuitous claim after another, going so far, as noted above, to call for the "re-education" of those traditionally-minded Catholics in the conciliar structures whose scholastic philosophy teaches them that it is impossible to see "continuity in discontinuity." No, no amount of argumentation will convince those who have been waiting to rejoice for so long over this non-liberation of the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition that they are being treated in exactly the same way as the Catholics of Red China who have suffered for long in the underground but must pretend that it is possible to work within the framework of a Communist-dominated clergy for the advancement of the Faith. (Mister Potter's Big Cigar.)
What I wrote 1,327 days ago was castigated by many as a "slap in the face" of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI for his "generosity" to "liberate" the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition for Catholics yet attached to the structures of his counterfeit church of conciliarism. What I wrote on July 7, 2007, was true at the time, and has been proved consistently since that time, including with all of the agitation now over the possibility that the "rights" recognized in Summorum Pontificum are going to be restricted in yet another motu proprio.
It was 980 days ago that Dario Castrillon "Cardinal" Hoyos, who served as the the President of "Pontifical" Commission Ecclesia Dei from April 14, 2000, to July 8, 2009, explained in a talk to the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI was deadly serious in his desire to incorporate elements from the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service into the Trojan Horse that has been the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition ever since it was promulgated by Roncalli/John XXIII:
Let me say this plainly: the Holy Father wants the ancient use of the Mass to become a normal occurrence in the liturgical life of the Church so that all of Christ’s faithful – young and old – can become familiar with the older rites and draw from their tangible beauty and transcendence. The Holy Father wants this for pastoral reasons as well as for theological ones. In his letter accompanying Summorum Pontificum Pope Benedict wrote that:
"In the history of the liturgy there is growth and progress, but no rupture. What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful. It behooves all of us to preserve the riches which have developed in the Church’s faith and prayer, and to give them their proper place."
3. This brings me to my third point. You are rightly convinced that the usus antiquior is not a museum piece, but a living expression of Catholic worship. If it is living, we must also expect it to develop. Our Holy Father is also of this conviction. As you know, he chose motu proprio – that is on his own initiative – to alter the text of the prayer pro Iudæis in the Good Friday liturgy. The intention of the prayer was in no way weakened, but a formulation was provided which respected sensitivities.
Likewise, as you also know, Summorum Pontificum has also provided for the Liturgy of the Word to be proclaimed in the vernacular without being first read by the celebrant in Latin. Today’s Pontifical Mass, of course, will have the readings solemnly chanted in Latin, but for less solemn celebrations the Liturgy of the Word may be proclaimed directly in the language of the people. This is already a concrete instance of what our Holy Father wrote in his letter accompanying the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum:
"the two Forms of the usage of the Roman Rite can be mutually enriching: new Saints and some of the new Prefaces can and should be inserted in the old Missal. The “Ecclesia Dei” Commission, in contact with various bodies devoted to the usus antiquior, will study the practical possibilities in this regard."
Naturally we will be happy for your input in this important matter. I simply ask you not to be opposed in principle to the necessary adaptation which our Holy Father has called for.
This brings me to another important point. I am aware that the response of the Pontifical Commission “Ecclesia Dei” with regard to the observance of Holy Days of obligation has caused a certain amount of disturbance in some circles. It should be noted that the dates of these Holy Days remain the same in both the Missal of 1962 and the Missal of 1970. When the Holy See has given the Episcopal Conference of a given country permission to move certain Holy Days to the following Sunday, this should be observed by all Catholics in that country. Nothing prevents the celebration of the Feast of the Ascension, for example, on the prior Thursday, but it should be clear that this is not a Mass of obligation and that the Mass of the Ascension should also be celebrated on the following Sunday. This is a sacrifice which I ask you to make with joy as a sign of your unity with the Catholic Church in your country. (http://thenewliturgicalmovement.blogspot.com.)
And so it goes. The logic of where Summorum Pontificum was bound to lead was plain in the very words of its own text and in the accompanying letter issued by Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI on July 7, 2007. The passages from that accompanying letter quoted above by "Cardinal" Hoyos were very clear in their meaning. A trap was thus laid to "move" traditionally-minded Catholics into a hybrid Mass over the course of time. This "hybrid" Mass will not be the same everywhere and in all places. Offerings of the Motu Mass will vary from place to place. The uniformity that was expressive of the unity of the Church and the very permanence of God Himself has been shattered by Summorum Pontificum.
Some Motu communities have attempted to adhere to as "much" of the modernized 1961 Missal of Giovanni Roncalli/John XXIII as they can "get away with." Other communities and many diocesan offerings of the "Motu Mass" have, as noted above, featured the sorts of changes envisioned by Summorum Pontificum that were reiterated in no uncertain terms by "Cardinal" Hoyos in 2008 address to the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales. The Novus Ordo's very spirit of liturgical instability and unpredictability has become a most distinguishing characteristic of liturgical life in the Motu world. After all, the spirit of the Protestant and Novus Ordo service is such that liturgical uniformity from one "celebrant" to another, no less from one parish to another, is an impossibility. Experimentation is encouraged, and "papal" spinmeister "Father" Federico Lombardi, S.J., has told us recently that conciliar authorities have no intention of restricting such experimentation in the name of the "liturgical renewal" that has so devastated the Faith in the lives of hundreds upon hundreds of millions of Catholics who are as of yet attached to the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism (see Grand Illusions).
Such experimentation is well underway with respect to "moving" traditionally-minded Catholics in the conciliar structures over the course of time in the direction of accepting a "reform of the reform" as the "normative" Mass for Catholics in the Roman Rite of the conciliar structures.
This is the precise goal of Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI himself:
"Neither the Missal of Pius V and John XXIII -- used by a small minority -- nor that of Paul VI -- used today with much spiritual fruit by the greatest majority -- will be the final 'law of prayer' of the Catholic Church." (Father Federico Lombardi, Zenit, July 15, 2007.)
From this point of view, then, the new prayer for the Jews in the liturgy in the ancient rite does not weaken, but postulates an enrichment of the meaning of the prayer in use in the modern rite. Exactly like in other cases, it is the modern rite that postulates an enriching evolution of the ancient rite. In a liturgy that is perennially alive, as the Catholic liturgy is, this is the meaning of the coexistence between the two rites, ancient and modern, as intended by Benedict XVI with the motu proprio "Summorum Pontificum."
This is a coexistence that is not destined to endure, but to fuse in the future "in a single Roman rite once again," taking the best from both of these. This is what then-cardinal Ratzinger wrote in 2003 – revealing a deeply held conviction – in a letter to an erudite representative of Lefebvrist traditionalism, the German philologist Heinz-Lothar Barth. (Sandro Magister, A Bishop and a Rabbi Defend the Prayer for the Salvation of the Jews.)
It must be remembered that the the very Missal that was chosen by the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre for use in the Society of Saint Pius X--and the one which the conciliar Vatican has always demanded to be used by priests offering "indult" Masses--was in place for all of three years before it was supplanted by the Ordo Missae of 1965, which was itself a prelude to the Novus Ordo of 1969. The 1961 Missal of Giovanni Roncalli/John XXIII was transitional of its very nature. What has happened in the 1,327 days is that the liturgical clock in the indult/Motu world, which was frozen in 1962 since Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II's Quattuor abhinc annos, October 3, 1984, has been "unfrozen." It has been ticking once again, to be "frozen" once more when there is a "happy merger" of the 1962 and 1969 Missals into whatever passes for the "norm" in 2008 or 2009 or 2011 or 2043 according to the directives of "Pontifical" Commission Ecclesia Dei, which is now under the direct superversion of the Modernist by the name of William "Cardinal" Levada, the prefect of the conciliar church's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (see
Anathematized by His Own Words, No Need to be in Limbo Any Longer, Piracy, Conciliar Style, Red Carpet For A Modernist, Words Really Do Matter, Short And To The Catholic Point, and Surely He Jests).
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI explained this himself 1,327 days ago in his accompanying letter to Summorum Pontificum and in his March 10, 2009,
Letter
to the "Bishops" of the counterfeit church of conciliarism concerning the remission of the
excommunication of the four Bishops consecrated by Archbishop Lefebvre
It is true that there have been exaggerations and at times social aspects unduly linked to the attitude of the faithful attached to the ancient Latin liturgical tradition. Your charity and pastoral prudence will be an incentive and guide for improving these. For that matter, the two Forms of the usage of the Roman Rite can be mutually enriching: new Saints and some of the new Prefaces can and should be inserted in the old Missal. The "Ecclesia Dei" Commission, in contact with various bodies devoted to the usus antiquior, will study the practical possibilities in this regard. The celebration of the Mass according to the Missal of Paul VI will be able to demonstrate, more powerfully than has been the case hitherto, the sacrality which attracts many people to the former usage. The most sure guarantee that the Missal of Paul VI can unite parish communities and be loved by them consists in its being celebrated with great reverence in harmony with the liturgical directives. This will bring out the spiritual richness and the theological depth of this Missal. (Explanatory Letter to the "Bishops" that accompanied the Motu Proprio Summorum.)
Leading men and women to God, to the God Who speaks in the Bible:
this is the supreme and fundamental priority of the Church and of the
Successor of Peter at the present time. A logical consequence of this is
that we must have at heart the unity of all believers. Their disunity,
their disagreement among themselves, calls into question the credibility
of their talk of God. Hence the effort to promote a common witness by Christians to their faith - ecumenism - is part of the supreme priority.
Added to this is the need for all those who believe in God to join in
seeking peace, to attempt to draw closer to one another, and to journey
together, even with their differing images of God, towards the source of
Light - this is inter-religious dialogue. Whoever proclaims that God is
Love 'to the end' has to bear witness to love: in loving devotion to
the suffering, in the rejection of hatred and enmity - this is the
social dimension of the Christian faith, of which I spoke in the
Encyclical 'Deus caritas est'.
"So if the arduous task of working for faith,
hope and love in the world is presently (and, in various ways, always)
the Church's real priority, then part of this is also made up of acts of
reconciliation, small and not so small. That the quiet gesture of
extending a hand gave rise to a huge uproar, and thus became exactly the
opposite of a gesture of reconciliation, is a fact which we must
accept. But I ask now: Was it, and is it, truly wrong in this case to
meet half-way the brother who 'has something against you' and to seek
reconciliation? Should not civil society also try to forestall
forms of extremism and to incorporate their eventual adherents - to the
extent possible - in the great currents shaping social life, and thus
avoid their being segregated, with all its consequences? Can
it be completely mistaken to work to break down obstinacy and
narrowness, and to make space for what is positive and retrievable for
the whole? I myself saw, in the years after 1988, how the
return of communities which had been separated from Rome changed their
interior attitudes; I saw how returning to the bigger and broader Church
enabled them to move beyond one-sided positions and broke down rigidity so that positive energies could emerge for the whole.
Can we be totally indifferent about a community which has 491 priests,
215 seminarians, 6 seminaries, 88 schools, 2 university-level
institutes, 117 religious brothers, 164 religious sisters and thousands
of lay faithful? Should we casually let them drift farther from the
Church? I think for example of the 491 priests. We cannot know how mixed
their motives may be. All the same, I do not think that they would have
chosen the priesthood if, alongside various distorted and unhealthy elements,
they did not have a love for Christ and a desire to proclaim Him and,
with Him, the living God. Can we simply exclude them, as representatives
of a radical fringe, from our pursuit of reconciliation and unity? What
would then become of them? (Letter
to the "Bishops" of the counterfeit church of conciliarism concerning the remission of the
excommunication of the four Bishops consecrated by Archbishop Lefebvre.)
The supposedly forthcoming new and improved mousetrap, which will restrict offerings or simulations of those non-Roman traditional rites (Dominican, Carmelite, Ambrosian, Mozarabic) not specifically covered by Summorum Pontificum but have been revived somewhat since its issuance, is designed to further break down "rigidity" in the name of ecclesiastical unity so that "exaggerations" of traditionally-minded Catholics in the conciliar structures can be overcome once and for all. "Cardinal" Hoyos's June 14, 2008, talk to the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales was just a foretaste of how the "exaggerations" of the "faithful attached to the ancient Latin liturgical tradition" are being "improved" by the "charity and pastoral prudence" of the doctrinal and liturgical revolutionaries of the counterfeit church of conciliarism. Even the modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition is being "simplified," which was, after all, one of the principal raisons d'etre of the hijacked Liturgical Movement that helped to give birth to the Novus Ordo (as well as the changes that preceded it dating back to the 1950s). The "simplification of the liturgy" is also one of the principal raisons d'etre for the Novus Ordo's ultimate precursor, Protestantism. Modernism does indeed feature many aspects of Protestantism. Liturgical "simplification" is simply one among many.
The new and improved mousetrap that might be forthcoming soon has caused some traditionally-minded Catholics in the conciliar structures to express concerns that diocesan "bishops" of the conciliar church won't be able to "ordain" men to the conciliar presbyterate by using the traditional rite of priestly ordinations. Such well-meaning Catholics are oblivious to the simple truth that there are no current diocesan "ordinaries" in the counterfeit church of conciliarism who are true bishops as the conciliar rite of episcopal consecration is as invalid as the conciliar rite of priestly ordination. What difference does it make the the non-bishops of the conciliar church can't use the traditional rite of priestly ordination since they have no power from God to ordain anyone to anything, no less the Catholic priesthood?
Moreover, the new and improved mousetrap that might be forthcoming from Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI is premised on the acceptance of the supposition that traditionally-minded Catholics must content themselves with an increasingly modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition while ignoring the "pontiff's made offenses against the Catholic Faith, which are, of course, nothing other than expressions of conciliarism's defections from the Faith. This is exactly the same situation that Anglo-Catholics found themselves in as members of the false Anglican sect and that they find themselves in now as members of the false conciliar sect. Traditionally-minded Catholics have accepted a partial and Modernist version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition in exchange for acquiescing to the false "pope's" denial of the nature of dogmatic truth and his esteeming of the symbols of false religions and his beliefs that "religions" can fight "irreligion" as he embraces religious liberty and separation of Church, frequently contradicting almost word for word the teachings of our true popes on these matters.
Yes, it is the Faith Itself that is under attack by the whole Modernist ethos of conciliarism. The Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service has been the chief means by which the conciliar revolutionaries have accustomed Catholics to the concept of change and novelty and innovation in liturgical life in order to convince them to accept change and novelty and evolution and innovation in matters of doctrine. The bludgeon of obedience to false ecclesiastical authority was used to compel compliance to liturgical changes, which many older priests and consecrated religious resisted, and it is that same bludgeon of obedience to blasphemers and apostates that has been used to compel compliance with false ecumenism and inter-religious "dialogue" and religious liberty and the new ecclesiology and episcopal collegiality and all of the other defections from the Faith represented by conciliarism.
Those in the Motu world, especially some of the younger bloggers of the recently minted "go-to Motu" sites who are unwilling to study the problems with the New Theology that has been condemned decisively by Pope Pius XII or to admit the Catholic doctrine has been undermined by conciliarism and one of its chief progenitors and apologists, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, who are now fretting over possible "restrictions" to the "rights" recognized in Summorum Pontificum must close their eyes to all of this as they revel in having an increasingly Novus Ordoized version of an already modernized version of the Immemorial Mass of Tradition that was, as noted before, the norm in the Roman Rite of the conciliar structures for precisely three years before being supplanted by the Ordo Missae of 1965 on Sunday, November 29, 1964. Such fretting is misplaced: the souls for whom Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ shed every single drop of His Most Precious Blood on the wood of the Holy Cross are being deceived as the honor and majesty and glory of the Most Holy Trinity are being decimated in full public view and in the name of what appears to most people in the world to be the "Catholic" Church.
Is God pleased with public esteem being given to the symbols of false religions by one claiming be his Vicar on earth
Is God pleased when that same putative "pontiff" takes off his shoes and enters into a mosque and then assumes a Mohammedan prayer position, calling mosques as "sacred" places?
Is God pleased with a man believing himself to be the Successor of Saint Peter permits himself to be treated as an inferior in one mosque and four different synagogues?
Is God pleased with false ecumenism and the inter-religious prayer services that one pope condemned after another as violations of Catholic doctrine? (See Bishop George Hay,
The Laws of God Forbidding All Communication in Religion With Those of a False Religion.)
Did God really permit the true popes of past centuries to be wrong in the praise they lavished the Angelic Doctor whose philosophy, Scholasticism, is deemed by Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI to be "too closed in on itself"?
Does God want the clarity of Scholasticism replaced with the contradiction and the paradox of the New Theology?
Oh, sure, there will be loads of people who will keep on repeating the condemned Gallican error that we can "pick and choose" what comes out of the conciliar Vatican, assuring themselves and others that most of the egregious things that occur in the conciliar church represent nothing "official," nothing "binding" on the consciences of Catholics worldwide. Obviously, this is true, although not because the Gallican errors condemned by Pope Pius VI in Auctorem Fidei on August 28, 1794, are the basis for recognizing a valid pontiff while resisting almost everything he does and says. I believed in this myself for a time before coming to realize that the Catholic Church cannot give us error of any kind and that those who propagate errors that they know to be contradictory to the Catholic Faith fall from the Faith as per Pope Leo XIII's cogent summary of Catholic doctrine on this matter in Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896:
The Church, founded on these principles and mindful of her office, has done nothing with greater zeal and endeavour than she has displayed in guarding the integrity of the faith. Hence she regarded as rebels and expelled from the ranks of her children all who held beliefs on any point of doctrine different from her own. The Arians, the Montanists, the Novatians, the Quartodecimans, the Eutychians, did not certainly reject all Catholic doctrine: they abandoned only a tertian portion of it. Still who does not know that they were declared heretics and banished from the bosom of the Church? In like manner were condemned all authors of heretical tenets who followed them in subsequent ages. "There can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison, infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by Apostolic tradition" (Auctor Tract. de Fide Orthodoxa contra Arianos).
The practice of the Church has always been the same, as is shown by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers, who were wont to hold as outside Catholic communion, and alien to the Church, whoever would recede in the least degree from any point of doctrine proposed by her authoritative Magisterium. Epiphanius, Augustine, Theodoret, drew up a long list of the heresies of their times. St. Augustine notes that other heresies may spring up, to a single one of which, should any one give his assent, he is by the very fact cut off from Catholic unity. "No one who merely disbelieves in all (these heresies) can for that reason regard himself as a Catholic or call himself one. For there may be or may arise some other heresies, which are not set out in this work of ours, and, if any one holds to one single one of these he is not a Catholic" (S. Augustinus, De Haeresibus, n. 88).
The need of this divinely instituted means for the preservation of unity, about which we speak is urged by St. Paul in his epistle to the Ephesians. In this he first admonishes them to preserve with every care concord of minds: "Solicitous to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph. iv., 3, et seq.). And as souls cannot be perfectly united in charity unless minds agree in faith, he wishes all to hold the same faith: "One Lord, one faith," and this so perfectly one as to prevent all danger of error: "that henceforth we be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the wickedness of men, by cunning craftiness, by which they lie in wait to deceive" (Eph. iv., 14): and this he teaches is to be observed, not for a time only-"but until we all meet in the unity of faith...unto the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ" (13). But, in what has Christ placed the primary principle, and the means of preserving this unity? In that-"He gave some Apostles-and other some pastors and doctors, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ" (11-12).
It is always a helpful thing to be a member of the Catholic Church in order to hold ecclesiastical office within her ranks.
We place our trust, as always, in our dear Blessed Mother's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart, praying as many Rosaries each day as our freely chosen states-in-life permit, understanding that the graces won for us on Calvary by the shedding of her Divine Son's Most Precious Blood and that flow into our hearts and souls through her loving hands as the Mediatrix of All Graces are sufficient to see us through this period of the Church Militant on earth's Mystical Passion, Death and Burial.
Remember these words of Pope Pius XI, contained in Quas Primas, December 11, 1925:
History, in fact, tells us that in the course of ages these festivals have been instituted one after another according as the needs or the advantage of the people of Christ seemed to demand: as when they needed strength to face a common danger, when they were attacked by insidious heresies, when they needed to be urged to the pious consideration of some mystery of faith or of some divine blessing. Thus in the earliest days of the Christian era, when the people of Christ were suffering cruel persecution, the cult of the martyrs was begun in order, says St. Augustine, "that the feasts of the martyrs might incite men to martyrdom." The liturgical honors paid to confessors, virgins and widows produced wonderful results in an increased zest for virtue, necessary even in times of peace. But more fruitful still were the feasts instituted in honor of the Blessed Virgin. As a result of these men grew not only in their devotion to the Mother of God as an ever-present advocate, but also in their love of her as a mother bequeathed to them by their Redeemer. Not least among the blessings which have resulted from the public and legitimate honor paid to the Blessed Virgin and the saints is the perfect and perpetual immunity of the Church from error and heresy. We may well admire in this the admirable wisdom of the Providence of God, who, ever bringing good out of evil, has from time to time suffered the faith and piety of men to grow weak, and allowed Catholic truth to be attacked by false doctrines, but always with the result that truth has afterwards shone out with greater splendor, and that men's faith, aroused from its lethargy, has shown itself more vigorous than before.
Isn't it time to pray a Rosary now so that we can plant a few more seeds that might result, please God and by the intercession of Our Lady, in the restoration of the Catholic Faith and the vanquishing of conciliarism and all of its egregious errors and novelties and blasphemies and sacrileges and heresies once and for all? Just one Rosary more. Right now. Isn't it time?
Viva Cristo Rey!
Our Lady of the Rosary, us.
Saint Joseph, pray for us.
Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.
Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.
Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.
Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.
Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.
Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.
Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.
Saint Simeon, pray for us.
Saint Bernadette Soubirous, pray for us.
See also: A Litany of Saints
