16 December 2016

Seminary training (2)

Continues ...
 (2) General Norms 1 and 4 clearly subordinate the Diocesan Bishop, in this matter of training ordinandi, to the Episcopal Conference. There have been other evidences of this most deplorable tendency in recent legislation. I deplore it on the doctrinal grounds that the Lord has set his Church up as Universal and Particular ... and the Particular Church is not a National Episcopal Conference but the Church in communion with its bishop. This desired subordination of Bishop to Conference represents an attack upon the status of both the Universal Church and the Particular Church. And I object to it on the practical grounds that it, unhappily, it is linked to current attempts within the Church, by (what Blessed John Henry Newman so neatly called) "an arrogant and insolent faction", to gain control and to exercise a dictatorial power which is unmindful of Tradition, doing this by means of powerful conferences and bully boy bureaucracies. Long live Apostolos suos. Long live Gerhard Mueller.

(3) Para 4 cheerfully informs us (without explanation) that presbyters are ordained "by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit". Such epicletic enthusiasms do not conform to the spirit and genius (or the texts) of the Roman Church and her liturgy, in which the Episcopate is typologically aggregated to the Aaronic High Priest; the Presbyters to the Temple Priests; and the Deacons to the Levites. This was the clear teaching of the Roman Church from I Clement down to the aftermath of Vatican II, when Dom Botte got his hands on the Pontifical.

(4) Paragraph 166, on the teaching of Scripture, fails to mention the importance of teaching the Typological way of understanding the Scriptures. It seems to think that the Old Testament is studied, not because it is central to our Religion (which it is), but mainly in order to enable Catholics to be chummy with present-day post-Biblical Jamnian Synagogue-centred Judaism ... a radically different religion from the Altar-centred cult of the Old Testament of which we are the continuators. I doubt if one would catch those who train rabbis explaining that the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings should be studied so that their students will understand Christians better! Of course not! The reason for that, G*d bless them, is that they have not lost their nerve, their self-confidence.

(5) In Paragraph 183, it does not seem to occur to those who drafted it to think that knowledge of Latin might have anything to do with Liturgy. Sacrosanctum Concilium is now remembered only as an archaic incantation, mumbo jumbo to be uttered in appropriate circumstances, not for what its actual text actually said ... Heaven forbid! That way would lie Rigidity!

What the Latin Church needs is a closer and more faithful conformity to the totality of her traditions, not only to documents dated later than 1961, or, even worse, after 2012. If the elements I have cited from this new Vatican document are anything to go by, the gulf between the Traditum and the everyday life of the modern Church is still being prised ever wider, and the wells of community Memory are still being rendered ever more polluted.

5 comments:

Highland Cathedral said...

I can't remember where I read it but I once read that a feature of liberal Catholic biblical scholars is a rejection of typology. Someone highly-placed in adult faith formation in my diocese once gave a talk about Mary at my local parish. He confined his talks to the New Testament. How he managed to talk about Mary without referring to the Old Testament I do not know. But at one point he made the aside (referring to one of the Gospels) "That's just an error". He fancied himself as a biblical scholar.

Mike Cliffson said...

Father:
I was very happy to see your pithy comments around a well expressed central fact quote "present-day post-Biblical Jamnian Synagogue-centred Judaism ... a radically different religion from the Altar-centred cult of the Old Testament of which we are the continuators."unquote.
Fits, if I may make so bold, with the end of yesterday's (normativa, Luke 7:24-30) Gospel:
‘I tell you, of all the children born of women, there is no one greater than John; yet the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he is. All the people who heard him, and the tax collectors too, acknowledged God’s plan by accepting baptism from John; but by refusing baptism from him the Pharisees and the lawyers had thwarted what God had in mind for them.’
(I let my mind wander in a Jamnian direction).
Usually your knowledge and erudition are way beyond me, and I greatly appreciate your explanations and/or examples for what I am sure many other followers of yours take as read. I'd be interested to see an anecdote about "the apocrapha " and so forth in the Anglican and Anglocatholic traditions , or whatever. Only if it should so suit you! ( My apologies if you have ever done so and I missed it ( at exam times, family crises, etc!).)God Bless!

Sadie Vacantist said...

Your analysis of para 166 sounds familiar and goes to the heart of the current crisis. These interminable debates by amateuer Thomists in respect of AL are of little significance by comparison.

Simple Simon said...

Giving more power to Bishops Conferences is just another way of initiating the primacy of the ‘local’ Church, leading to the emergence of the Catholic Church of Germany, America etc. The time has come for every orthodox bishop to quit such conferences. This would provide a very accurate head count of which bishops are supporting the four Cardinals. As for seminary training, the crucial issue is what will be taught, and who will teach it. If most of the Bishops of England and Wales are supportive of and have intimately embraced Pope Francis’ agenda, could one in good conscience pray for vocations to the priesthood? Abandon all hope, ye who enter Gethseminary.
‘Taste and see that the lord is good ’. Those of us who regularly sought sustenance from the life-giving 'wells of community memory’ could easily discern that AL was fool’s gold. And that Pope Francis was building his house on sand. And when the supporters of Pope Francis loudly repeat ad nauseam that the ‘reforms’ of Francis are ‘irreversible’ we need lose no sleep. They do not speak as Prophets.

Athelstane said...

Re: Bishops' conferences

They are indeed an unusually pernicious development in our Era of the Easter People. Too many bishops use them as an occasion to abdicate authority, or a totem to justify certain dubious things they favor anyway.

But in this pontificate lies danger in flouting them: Think of the good, late bishop of Ciudad de Este, who was removed by the Pope for what amounted to failure to play well with others in his bishops' conference in Paraguay - especially as regards seminary formation. There was no small resentment of the fact that in this regard he had managed to attract more seminarians than all the other dioceses of Paraguay put together.