Wars and rumors of wars on the TLM and Summorum Pontificum”?

Perfect

 

Well said and gently conveyed!

 

If I remember correctly, Paul VI (a saint, I must accept, but I'm not compelled to ever pray to him), once declared that there were no issues of doctrine in the Second Vatican Council. This doesn't seem to me to be compatible with his statement of 1976.

More importantly, how can he talk of the Novus Ordo being 'conciliar', when all the evidence points to its being constructed after and outside the Council and by a commission devoid of Council Fathers? If this commission was truly conciliar, it would have remained firmly within the guidelines of the Council and restricted itself to the very minor modifications suggested by the Council Fathers. Instead, Pope Paul decided to do his own thing. The same could be said for all the popes who have succeeded him. This is a recipe for chaos...which is exactly what we have.

 

Just a further thought on this idea of Pope Paul that man's 'mentality' had changed. Firstly, it's a very vague and undefined reason to explain the radical changes of the sixties. Secondly, since when did popes become the unchallenged and unchallengeable authority for such a thing? Is their role not to infallibly defend the Faith that has been handed down, not to indulge in psychological speculation?

The idea is somewhat Teilhardian. If, somehow, our 'mentality' (whatever that is) has changed, does this imply that we have somehow 'evolved'? If the answer is in the affirmative, is it not logical to suggest that the Incarnation is obsolete? After all, that must have been for a different sort of men. We're cooler now, with a new, modern, hip (apologies to John Lee Hooker, whose music remains great) 'mentality'; we can permit ourselves to engage in previously forbidden activities; we can worship other spirits. Some even claim that God's, or more precisely, the Holy Spirit's 'mentality' has changed. To disagree is to be rigid and backwardist.

 

Can't help myself
I think in the spirit of the liturgy Ratzinger argues that there was only organic growth and development with the liturgy. At times pruning of accretions that obscured the sublime reality conveyed through the signs etc. NEVER was the liturgy a plaything of "experts". A literal CONCOTION made up after the Council and undermining what in fact was mandated

 

So well said. Last night on EWTN Raymond Arroyo was interviewing a nun from the Daughters of Charity who are ending their order. They are taking no new members--theyve had no new members for 20 years. He asked her why since VII so many orders have dried up and could their decisions to "modernize" have anything to do with it? She flatly rejected that. She stuck to her conviction that God was doing something new. Yet other orders who kept the habit and their original mission are flourishing. She said she wished them well but wondered how many of their new vocations would actually stay.
Teihard spread a poisonous heresy that took hold in the early 20th century and is still afflicting the Church. The series of talks on Our Lady of Revelation makes a good case that he was the wormwood star from Revelation that poisoned the pure water of doctrine. From his own words in his autobiography it appears he may well have been possessed.

 

That's my bishop. What a bold statement!

 

VERY helpful.

 

I had not been aware of the following. Obviously, Pope John Paul II didn't believe the TLM was abrogated.

https://lms.org.uk/the-norms-of-1986

 

https://www.pillarcatholic.com/p/cardinal-gregory-and-dealing-with
Cardinal Wilton Gregory answered questions about the TLM.
Gregory’s remarks on liturgy came during a question-and-answer period he offered during a Dec. 6 appearance the cardinal made at The Catholic University of America.

Slated to speak about diversity in the Church, Gregory was asked after his speech about liturgical diversity — a student leader at CUA asked the cardinal how he should respond to the large number of students who have asked him why Mass is not available on campus using the liturgical rubrics which precede the Second Vatican Council.

Gregory gave a rather lengthy answer, in which he offered his sense of the intended purpose of Traditionis custodes, and offered his take on liturgical history since the Second Vatican Council. The cardinal indicated that he believed that he has accommodated the desire for the Traditional Latin Mass by providing one venue for it north of Washington, D.C., one in the city — close to CUA — and one in the southern part of his diocese.

But he also emphasized his belief that liturgical uniformity is an important goal, and his support for Pope Francis’ efforts on that front.

After he concluded his first answer on the question, and when a moderator was planning to take another question, Gregory went back to the topic.
“I also want to add something,” the cardinal said.

“In many of the places where it grew — the Tridentine rite — it grew because priests promoted it. And not because people — in other words, if you had a guy that came into the parish, and said, ‘Well, I like this rite, I’m gonna do it,’ and he gathered people together, and now all the sudden he created the need, in places where there wasn’t a need there.”

“So I think that the Holy Father is right to say: ‘Deal with the priests.’”

It is possible that Gregory’s observation about the growth of the more ancient liturgy resonates with his own experience as a bishop in Illinois, Georgia, and the Archdiocese of Washington — though some in the DC area have challenged that assertion.

And soon after his remarks began circulating online, priests who celebrate the older liturgy began pushing back, with many of them indicating that they learned the “Old Mass” because parishioners had asked for it — especially among the growing number of young people across the U.S. who say they want to experience the pre-conciliar liturgy.

There is very little reliable data about the spread of the older liturgical form during the period when it was broadly permitted in the Church, under the provisions of Benedict XVI’s Summorum pontificum. It is therefore impossible to tell how frequently it was introduced in parishes mostly by priests, and how frequently it cropped up where laity asked for it.

Of course, some Catholics would say that to the extent that priests did introduce the older liturgy to their people, they were drawing from their formation, their studies, and their experience to offer people a way of worship that might resonate with them — and that doing so was perfectly legitimate under the aegis of the Church’s law at the time.

Some Catholics would also suggest that the spread of the older rite among young people — the demand for it at Catholic University, for example — indicates that those priests were right in their judgment, and that it is remarkable to see young people enthusiastic about the question of how they worship, in a period of widespread and accelerating institutional disaffiliation.

In other words, some Catholics would wonder if Gregory wouldn’t want to capture the enthusiasm of young people for liturgy, rather than to quell it......see more at the link.....the comments are interesting

But regardless of how the older rubrics spread in the U.S., some priests expressed surprise Friday at Gregory’s concluding sentiment, which seemed to say that their pastoral initiative and judgment meant they were in some way causing a problem, and therefore needed to be “dealt with.”

The cardinal’s rhetoric seemed to suggest to some priests that they were not believed when they said that young people wanted the older liturgy, or that their efforts to reach young people using an option that had been legally available to them until 2021 made them suspect, or a problem.

But the remarkable candor of Gregory’s remarks pointed to an issue worth noting in the Church — the obstacles to restoring trust among priests for their diocesan bishops.

In his remarks Wednesday, Gregory emphasized that he agreed with Pope Francis about the need for priests celebrating the older liturgy to be “dealt with.” That emphasis was evocative of the pope’s recent admonition against the “scandal of young priests trying on cassocks and hats, or albs and lace robes.”

Gregory’s words, and Francis’, revealed a gap — probably a broad generational gap — in the way that liturgical matters are perceived among clerics. Where older liturgies and attention to vestments are apparently regarded by Gregory and Francis as evidence of “clericalism,” they are, for younger clerics, often seen as a way of both serving their people, and serving God.

Generational gaps happen, of course. They are to be expected. But a set of data analytics published earlier this year suggests the particular gap into which Gregory stepped — differing perceptions over liturgy — is part of a specific set of problems that makes difficult establishing trust between bishops and their priests.

—
In October, the Catholic Project at CUA released a new set of data from its national study of Catholic priests, conducted by a team of researchers and analysts at the university.

That data identified that while priests of Gregory’s generation largely identify themselves as theologically “progressive” or “very progressive,” younger priests are most likely to identify themselves as theologically “conservative,” with almost none identifying as “very liberal.” Presumably, those theological orientations extend to perspectives on liturgy.

In the long-term that CUA data indicates that eventually the Church will likely shift away from Francis’ approach to liturgical questions. Almost no priests of recent ordination cohorts identify themselves theologically as “very progressive,” and the number of priests ordained even in the last two decades of a “progressive” orientation has been declining.

That data means that discontentment with the Francis approach to liturgy is likely to become more pronounced in years to come, even among newly appointed bishops, drawn from the less theologically “progressive” cohorts of priests.

That could mean eventually that a larger cadre of bishops will take up the “reform of the reform” liturgical approach, or even that they will eventually call for a new Roman missal to be developed, or at least for a new version of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, which governs its practical interpretation.

In short, the data indicates that simply pushing for a particular style of uniformity within the ordinary form — while bishops across the country restrict even things like the ad orientem posture — will probably backfire for many bishops, and could actually hasten a more significant discussion about post-conciliar liturgy in the decades to come.

 

I am somewhat familiar with this. I am in Cardinal Gregory’s diocese and have experienced the extraordinary form in Southern Maryland for many years. That’s the TLM. It has been whittled down to 1 Mass in Southern Maryland on Sunday, and as the Cardinal said, there might be one other place to find a TLM, maybe in the city. That’s not a lot. We belong to a very holy parish which I appreciate. But still.

 

According to Cardinal Gregory, "the Tridentine Rite grew because priests promoted it". The truth is that the Tridentine Rite is growing because faithful parishioners desire it. I can see that in the Traditional Latin Mass-parishes that I have been attending (Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer, FSSP, SSPX), which are all growing with young families striving for holiness. In my current parish, we now have to expand the church because it cannot fit all the parishioners anymore, despite of having three Sunday masses.

Personally, I received baptism, confirmation and first holy communion in the Novus Ordo-rite. Subsequently, I began to draw deeper and deeper into the faith and the holy liturgy, and I slowly changed over to the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM). This is in line with many other Catholics - I am by far not the only one . There is a real trend towards the TLM, whereas the parishioner group of Novus Ordo-masses tends to get older.

I agree with 'Pope Francis' and Cardinal Gregory that liturgical uniformity is an important goal. Therefore, the Traditional Latin Mass should be promoted to be the ordinary form of Holy Mass, whilst the Novus Ordo could remain as an extraordinary form where parishioners desire it. This would ensure liturgical uniformity globally, as all Holy Masses would be celebrated in the same language, Latin. It would also ensure liturgical uniformity with the Communion of Saints throughout the ages, who have celebrated the Traditional Latin Mass.

Most importantly, pew research shows that parishioners who attend the TLM tend to actually believe and practice what Catholics believe, whereas many Novus Ordo-parishioners have started to embrace contraception or even abortion, as well as liturgical abuse such as not kneeling during the consecration or receiving Holy Communion on the hand, etc.

The trend towards the TLM with ever growing numbers of young families, a worthily celebrated liturgy, and much holiness and good fruits, is undeniable. No Pope or Anti-Pope can stop it.

 

Gregory, who has been the head of the Archdiocese of Washington since 2019, said he believes that by restricting the Traditional Latin Mass, “the Holy Father is trying to complete what Paul VI began,” that is, establish “the new rite as the dominant rite, but with exceptions, modest exceptions.”

“Tradition dies a slow death, sometimes a bloody death,” Gregory added, pointing out that “two hundred years after Trent, there were still places that were celebrating the pre-Trenten Mass, so it took that long.”

As to why the new form of the Mass should be the dominant rite, Gregory said that it’s “because that’s the Church’s liturgy.” “If you want to belong to another ritual family, you can be Ruthenian, you can be Maronite, you can be Melkite, but the Roman rite has one dominant rite.”

Gregory also said the Church’s goal is to unite people around the new Mass over time by also restricting the number of priests who are allowed to celebrate the old Mass.

“Any priest that wishes to celebrate that has to write to the bishop and say I accept the liturgical reform, I’m not fighting the reform, but I’d like to be able to make myself available to celebrate under these conditions; that’s for priests who are already priests,” Gregory explained, adding that “anyone who is not yet ordained but would like to learn to celebrate [the old Mass] has to write to Rome.”

Washington archbishop addresses decision to limit Traditional Latin Mass | Catholic News Agency

 

Unite people around one liturgy.

What people?

Would someone like to tell Gregory the pews are by and large empty, especially of young people.

 

This is a feature, not a bug.

 

When I was young we used to have the SPPX Mass in our house when I was a teen. It was there because my parents wanted it and along with many other good layfolk really went out of their way to get it, making very great Sacrifices to do so. No one talked them into it,

People love the Old Mass and want it. Nowadays more than ever. At present we not only have a home but a Church to say it in. I was at Mass this morning at 8AM in our Church and it was crowded. The 11 am Mass will be packed and the Mass at 6 pm will be crowded too. It grows bigger and bigger by the week. Notably with young families and young people. You'll simply not get this kinda thing with the 1960's Mass. Not elsewhere not anywhere.

It works and you can't argue with success. It works and it works very,very well indeed, so why bury it?