Rorate: On the loss of Latin

This post from Rorate Caeli is a good starting point for investigating the anti-intellectualism that has come upon the Church in the last forty years.

Letter to the Bishops

Father Z has an English translation of the letter Benedict XVI has sent out to all the bishops regarding the FSSPX and the Williamson affair. Father Z makes pertinent observations throughout in his usual style and I don't feel the need to reproduce the letter here or pull out any excerpts.

My observation after reading it is pretty simple. If you want the letter's technical merits, you'll need to look elsewhere. I found the letter to be direct and to the point, not at all like so many other letters we get out of Rome. Benedict XVI was obviously not expecting and ended up being personally affected by the Williamson affair and it shows in his letter. While I am not one to prognosticate, I would venture a guess that this letter may prove to be a turning point, not in the FSSPX's relations with Rome perhaps, but rather in Benedict's mindset so far.

The Pope and Israel

Spengler is the pen name of the anonymous columnist for Asia Times Online. Even though he's not one of the Vaticanisti or even known to be Catholic, his writings are as astute as they come when it comes to analysis of the current pontificate.
------------------------------

Benedict's tragedy, and Israel's
By Spengler [atimes.com]

World history is the history of Israel, argued the great German-Jewish theologian Franz Rosenzweig - not the tiny Jewish nation as such, but the Jewish idea, embraced by billions in the form of Christianity, or parodied and rejected by additional billions in Islam. The trouble is that no one wants to actually be Israel, least of all the Jews, who recite with fervor the prayer of Sholom Aleichem's Tevye: "God of mercy, choose a different people!" Jealousy at Israel's Election has provoked the persecution of the Jews for millennia, and it is not surprising that many Jews look for safety in insignificance.

Like many Jewish prayers, Tevye's prayer to be un-chosen also has become popular among some Catholics. The Catholic Church holds itself to be Israel, the People of God descended from Abraham in the Spirit. But many Catholics, including some in leading positions in the Roman Curia, think it an affront to the sensibilities of other cultures to insist on the unique role of the Church. At the other extreme , misnamed traditionalists do not think that the mustard-seed of faith is sufficient, and that the Church cannot fulfill its function without returning to the bygone days of state religion. Pope Benedict XVI, like his predecessor John Paul II, has fought manfully against these prospective deserters within his ranks. The tawdry burlesque over the case of the paranoid Jew-hater and Holocaust denier Richard Williamson is a sad gauge of his degree of success.
[...]
------------------------------

Go and read the rest.

The Living Church: Revisiting Vatican II | The New York Sun
By RICHARD JOHN NEUHAUS | August 13, 2008

An interesting article. Go check it out.

Time to Call It?

Rorate Caeli has this quote from the superior-general of the SSPX, Bishop Bernard Fellay that was taken from here:

And now, we have a perfectly liberal Pope, my very dear brothers. As he goes to this country [the United States] which is founded upon Masonic principles, that is, of a revolution, of a rebellion against God. And, well, he expressed his admiration, his fascination before this country which has decided to grant liberty to all religions. He goes so far as to condemn the confessional State. And he is called traditional! And this is true, this is true: he is perfectly liberal, perfectly contradictory. He has some good sides, the sides which we hail, for which we rejoice, such as what he has done for the Traditional liturgy.

What a mystery, my very dear brothers, what a mystery!

Father Z has commentary on the subject:

I cannot believe that a person who desires unity with the Roman Pontiff would stand up in a pulpit and say this sort of thing about the reigning Pope.

Thinking it is one thing, but saying it in a sermon is another.
However, this statement does underscore what I have been saying all along. The real problem for the SSPX is not so much the liturgical issue or the excommunications, or even some juridical structure they could fit into. Those things can be solved with the a few signatures.

The real obstacle is the Church’s teaching about religious liberty.

I agree with Father Z's assessment. I'd go so far as to say that it is perhaps time to step back and reflect. The Church is moving forward along other avenues. The SSPX one looks as though the barricade will not be removed anytime soon. Time to follow another of those avenues until this one is open.

The funny thing is that if we all lived with a Church and a society that Bishop Fellay so obviously prefers, he and his brethren would probably not be in a position to move forward with their views as they are now.

A History Lesson, Part I

No, I do not think 'an history lesson' makes any sense when you say it.

Read this at RORATE CAELI on the events of 1988, a period of church history I never learned about during my formative years (we didn't learn much church history, period).

Catholic Education

Aside from the larger places like Notre Dame, Boston College or Georgetown, I've always been interested in the status of the smaller places that advertise themselves as 'traditional' and all the other adjectives.

Father Z has a long post with various quotes from parents, students, alumni and even an official response to one allegation from Franciscan U. of Steubenville in Ohio. It's a fascinating look at 'Charismatic' orthodoxy meeting 'traditional' orthodoxy, if you all will permit me the use of such broad and non-specific terms.

Have a look.

Three reasons

Michael McGough of The LA Times has a piece on the MP.

This little snippet really says a lot:

The worst-case scenario is that the pope is reaching out to traditionalist followers of the late "rebel archbishop" Marcel Lefebvre, whose followers have problems with post-Vatican II Catholicism that extend well beyond the language in which the Mass is recited.

By God, it's a damned travesty if the Pope actually reaches out right instead of left!

How many minutes to Midnight?

"Basically, what we are in the grip of at the moment, and Benedict is one of the engineers of this, is what I would call a strong re-assertion of traditional Catholic identity,"

-John Allen, quoted by a Reuters story entitled, "Is Pope Benedict turning back Catholic clock?"

Father Reese of America fame chimes in in the same article:

"This is the Pope being the German professor who is going to clarify language in his classroom," said Father Tom Reese, senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University. "And he thinks the world is his classroom."

"The problem with that is that he defines what a church is and by doing so takes any discussion of what a church is off the table in dialogue (with other religions)," said Reese, a leading U.S. Jesuit author.
[...]

"His intention is not to insult people but many times that's the way it come across," Reese said. "He uses words the way he defines them whether people like it or not, whether it upsets gays, women, theologians, Protestants or Muslims."

George Weigel, a prominent U.S. lay Catholic theologian, author and leading conservative commentator:

"Christian communities which maintain a clear sense of their doctrinal and moral boundaries can not only survive the encounter with modernity, they can flourish within it. Whereas Christian communities which fudge their boundaries tend to wither and eventually die,"

And of course Mr. Allen gets the last word:

"The Vatican's calculation is that the retrenchment we are going through now may result in a smaller church but it will be a church that is more focused, more energetic, and in the long term that will pay off,"

Have fun as pundits, guys. I know I didn't reading you. :/

The Church of Christ

CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH

RESPONSES TO SOME QUESTIONS REGARDING CERTAIN ASPECTS
OF THE DOCTRINE ON THE CHURCH
[In English]

"It follows that these separated churches and Communities, though we believe they suffer from defects, are deprived neither of significance nor importance in the mystery of salvation. In fact the Spirit of Christ has not refrained from using them as instruments of salvation, whose value derives from that fullness of grace and of truth which has been entrusted to the Catholic Church"[12].

I was going to sort through one of the articles I read about the Responses, but the article is just too full of misinformation to even bother with and the reader response at the bottom is kind of sad.

Summorum Pontificum

LITTERAE APOSTOLICAE
MOTU PROPRIO DATAE

BENEDICTUS XVI

SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM
[In Latin]

---

LETTER OF HIS HOLINESS
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS ON THE OCCASION OF THE PUBLICATION
OF THE APOSTOLIC LETTER "MOTU PROPRIO DATA"
SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM
ON THE USE OF THE ROMAN LITURGY
PRIOR TO THE REFORM OF 1970
[In English]

Waiting for other things

Sandro Magister takes a look at curial reform (and the lack thereof):

Appointments made at a snail's pace. Documents that are useless or continually delayed. Offices drifting aimlessly. Why the renewal of the Vatican bureaucracy is not a priority for Benedict XVI

Along the way, I made a little outline because at first Magister is questioning stuff, but then he seemingly accepts Benedict XVI's strategy...

1. Unification of the councils which hasn't helped anything
The Pope unified councils, etc. But nothing came of it and now the councils are separating again. What was the point?

2. Bertone and Nicora: organizers?
The secretary of state and the head of the patrimony are great administrators and organizers and much of the onus has fallen to them with their appointments. Yet neither has offered much in the way of reform.

Here we have the turn in Magister's piece:

3. B16's priorities: preaching, celebrations, 'Jesus of Nazareth'
The Pope is all about convincing people through his preaching, through the liturgical celebrations (though Magister oddly forgets to mention the papal master of ceremonies whom Benedict has left in place and whom Magister quite dislikes).

4. Biding time equals waiting out his enemies
The issues Benedict waited on while things settled:
a. deputy secretary of state
b. Chinese Catholics letter
c. the Motu proprio

5. His trusted men, those from outside
Bertone for example as well as the secretary at Divine Worship as well as Hummes from South America, etc. Friends close, enemies closer...

6. The (careful) appointment of bishops
Magister mentions that the Holy Father ponders long and hard over extensive dossiers (no mention of the Warsaw debacle though).

7. Against careerism
Magister ends with a quote from the Pope:

“It is through Him that one must enter the service of shepherd. Jesus highlights very clearly this basic condition by saying: 'he who climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber" (Jn 10: 1). This word 'climbs' – 'anabainei' in Greek – conjures up the image of someone climbing over a fence to get somewhere out of bounds to him. 'To climb' – here too we can also see the image of careerism, the attempt to "get ahead", to gain a position through the Church: to make use of and not to serve. It is the image of a man who wants to make himself important, to become a person of note through the priesthood; the image of someone who has as his aim his own exaltation and not the humble service of Jesus Christ. But the only legitimate ascent towards the shepherd's ministry is the Cross. This is the true way to rise; this is the true door."

July 7th

MOTU PROPRIO

THE 1962 MISSAL

TO BE RELEASED

7 JULY

More information: Kath.net has the scoop; Gerald and Father have translations and comments:

Kath.net | Gerald | Father Z

An interview

This is from Alan Keyes' website. It's fairly straightforward. It'll be in The Wanderer on the 26th.

But Bishop Bruskewitz [Lincoln, Neb.] is not alone. The Cardinal Bernardin factor, which has dominated the makeup of the USCCB for the past 30 years, is finally giving way to younger prelates much more in line with the perennial teachings of the Church. Quietly, but assuredly, Bishop Álvaro Corrada of Tyler, Texas, is indeed one of these quiet, unknown bishops. His and Bishop Bruskewitz's perspectives on the Pope's recent remarks follow.

Bishop Bruskewitz and Bishop Corrada share their unique and complementary perspectives on the Second Vatican Council and Pope Benedict's December 22 address. This first interview deals specifically with the reception of the Second Vatican Council.

* * *

Q. Your Excellencies, Pope Benedict XVI's pre-Christmas Roman Curia address had a theme of the competing claims, and subsequent struggle, for the true Second Vatican Council. Do you have any comments?

Bishop Corrada: The Holy Father has been following this theme, and he picked it up from Pope John Paul II, but has emphasized it more. I think that Pope Benedict XVI has a very deep insight because of his philosophical and theological formation that the authentic teachings of the Church have to be followed, and that the Church has to come back to certain disciplines that some bishops and many of the faithful and priests have gotten away from.

And that discipline is the discipline of the sacraments, the discipline of the liturgy, and even the discipline of the Latin language. I think that is what he is making reference to, and I think it is wonderful that he is making that emphasis.
[...]

Bishop Bruskewitz: The majority of the Second Vatican Council fathers and the Popes never saw the council as discontinuous and as a rupture with the past. The emphasis was always in accord with the Council of Trent and the First Vatican Council — the unbroken continuity of Catholic Tradition, both in doctrine and in many other areas. There are those who understood, and still understand, the Second Vatican Council as some sort of revolutionary destruction of the past — a sort of French Revolution — that we are destroying everything in the past and starting new all over again, with a whole new [liturgical] calendar and everything.

It is not at all what the Second Vatican Council [fathers] understood themselves as doing.

What happened, however, is there was a para-council of periti, of experts, who all dominated through the whole matrix of media representation of what was going on at the council. Because of that, there were horrible distortions in the popular imagination, including the clerical imagination, including the priests. Even they saw this as a complete rupture. Emotionally and psychologically, people who intellectually might understand that the Mass is the same if you offer it in English or in Latin, [nonetheless] thought, "We have a whole new world here, and this doesn't really mean what it said."

We had this whole rising expectation, this para-council that gave this impression to the world that there was this big revolution. So, when this revolution hit some blank walls like "no women priests" and "no married priests," I think what happened was that then these expectations were frustrated. Then, people got all upset and more in a dissenting and rebellious mood.

When the history of the council is explained, it will be clear that Pope John XXIII never thought he was going make a tabula rasa by throwing away everything in the past and starting all anew, that this wasn't his idea at all. In fact, Pope John XXIII was super-traditional in many of the things he said and did.
[...]

Read the complete article Bishop Bruskewitz says... para-council distorted Vatican II from Renew America.