"Summorum Pontificum confirmed juridically that the Latin Church had lived for some four decades under the dominion of a lie. The Vetus Ordo had not been lawfully prohibited. Much persecution of devout priests and layfolk that took place during those decades is therefore now seen to have been vis sine lege [force without law]. For this so long to have been so true with regard to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which lies at the heart of the Church's life, argues a profound illness deep within the Latin Church. And the Big Lie was reinforced by multitudes of Little Lies ... that the Council mandated reordered sanctuaries ... that the Council mandated exclusive use of the vernacular ... The de facto situation created by the Big Lie and the Little Lies combined ought not to be regarded as normative. Its questionable parentage must give it a degree of provisionality, even (perhaps especially) to those who find it comfortable to live with. The onslaught upon the Franciscans of the Immaculate suggests that there are those, high in the Church's administration, who have still internalised neither the juridical findings of Summorum Pontificum nor its pastoral call for harmony."
I wrote this in January 2014. Rereading it seven years later, reproduced in Professor Kwasniewski's highly cogent recent article (onepeterfive), I feel its force even more strongly! A clique of men who now de facto hold high power in the Church never did respect the teaching of Summorum Pontificum; now, unhappily, they feel strong enough to demand that bishops, priests, and people should all bow down before them and their Big Lie.
On December 2 last, PF, in Cyprus, talked about the Latin Church as a "polychrome people", a "true point of encounter between different ethnicities and cultures." He went on to conclude:
"Please remember, walls do not and should not exist in the Catholic Church. For the Church is a common home, a place of relationships and of coexistence in diversity."
Oh Yeah?? So is this exciting "common home" big enough to encompass "in diversity" the Authentic Form of the Roman Rite?
We already had one indication of PF's preferred polychrome diversities when he explained to us (in Abu Dhabi) that they include the diversity of false religions. Pretty broad, huh? Pretty tolerant type of bloke, eh?
Strangely, his Epiphany homily on Wednesday showed a man still determined to continue his spiteful campaign of facile sneers against those fellow-Catholics whom he hates.
No; "hates" is not too strong a word. Hatred is the sick leitmotiv of this pontificate.
11 comments:
The brutal truth and we require far more of it from far more clerics and laity.
Who will cleanse the stables, so that those who profess the Catholic faith may be cleansed from our own sins and the sins committed against that same faith? Serious question...
Thank you Fr. Hunwicke.
"Vis sine lege": THAT is the term I have been groping for to describe all these things we've been living under, both in Church and State, that look like laws but really aren't. Thank you!
In order to understand this post, I would need first to grasp exactly what you signify by the "Vetus Ordo". Does it refer to a specific edition, varying from time to time, of the Roman Missal of 1570 and after? Particularly - does it refer to what TC calls the "Missal antecedent to the reform of 1970"? Would that not be the Missal authorised for England by the "Agatha Christi indult", which was the last promulgared (or was that the 1965 edition as decreed by Nuper edita Instructione?).
I take it there could be nothing invalid about any edition, but have always supposed that only the latest edition is used licitly. Or I had supposed it until in 1984 CDW authorised the 1962 by Quatuor abhinc annos.
I am sorry to niggle like this, but we are discussing law.
Of course if we simply want to say that TC is cruel, illogical, and will lead to bad consequences, then I agree.
Thank you, Father Hunwicke.
!962 is far from perfect. I'm all for a thousand flowers blossoming. The idea of law ... let alone strict law ... applying to Liturgy is fairly recent.
Thank you for this, Fr. Hunwicke. Spot on!
That's the thing. The Church is supposed to be loose and generous in certain areas (like personal devotion by laypeople in the pews), and extremely rigid and definite about everything that is fundamental.
But most of the post-Vatican II world reversed that. We teach and learn very little about fundamentals, much less being strong and definite about them. And then the smackdown is laid against all the stuff that is optional and diverse by nature, because God forbid that anyone have real personal devotions and spirituality.
(And notoriously, there's been a lot of pussyfooting and kindness towards clergy abusing, robbing, or sleeping with the flock, while there's been harsh retaliation against anyone who questions "liberal" bishops and clergy.)
It's really obnoxious; but at least there's now more pushback and knowledge, among the surviving people in the pews.
There's even a fair amount of ecumenism of the good kind, as members of apostolic churches band together online to defend apostolic and liturgical practices against non-liturgical churches, or as Trinitarian believers band together to teach and defend the Trinity against Unitarians, oneness theology, Muslims, JWs, and so on.
And it's mostly ordinary laypeople doing this stuff, because they have so much more freedom than clergy, or even lay employees of church/apologetics organizations.
When the front door gets blocked, the Holy Spirit gets in through all the doors and windows -- and even through the walls of people's hearts.
The only diversity Francis wants is that among the crinkly polyester bros, like Henry Ford, any colour as long as it is black.
You could not be more correct, Father Hunwicke. Hatred defines Francis---and it seems to be a long-etched feature of his personality if we are to go by serious observers who remind us of the vendettas for which he was well known.
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