I am a Traditionalist. My conscience was formed before Vatican II. Which is not to say that anyone else’s conscience was formed improperly after Vatican II but that there is a huge difference. There are some who are of an age with me or older than me who post here. The Catholicism in which we grew up is, for better or worse, significantly different from today. That’s not a judgment, merely a fact.
It’s not just a question of liturgy and worship. It is a question of what went on from 1965 through 1970. An entire sea-change in the Church which caused me not to leave HMC in the 70s but to stop attending. If I had not found a reverent NO parish, I would still be “out there”. I could never be a protestant and although I would have considered our Easter Orthodox brethren back in the 70s, I would not do so now.
My high school years were from 1965 through 1969. I was an altar boy up until 1968. I went to a Catholic high school. I regularly spent part of my lunch period before the Blessed Sacrament in the chapel. I could go to Confession on the way home. Daily. A downtown New Orleans church had priests avialable for Confession all during the day. I don’t believe we can say this now.
I had to pass two Catholic churches on my public bus ride home. Catholic piety back then called for you to make the Sign of the Cross upon passing in front of the Holy Eucharist. I wasn’t the only one to do this…and I don’t mean just my fellow students. I don’t believe we can say this now.
Granted, it was part of our culture. New Orleans was and is a predominately Catholic city. Movies and restaurants closed on Good Friday when I was in high school. Make no mistake about it, the New Orleans you see on TV is not the New Orleans of any Catholic I’ve ever known even to this day.
Ride the bus on Ash Wednesday and see the number of people with ashes on their foreheads.
In four short years after Vatican II, we went from piety being accepted as the norm; we went from an almost utter abject reverence for the Eucharist to guitars and music which sounded as if the Beatles could have written it. A wholesale abandonment of that which defined us as Catholic. Do any of you realize that in 1970 with the NO Mass we still received Communion kneeling down and on the tongue only?
Can you conceive being shocked to the core of your being, if the Holy Eucharist fell on the ground? Yes, shock - shock that Our Lord should be profaned. How many of you know today that only Father should pick it up? Or that in 1965 only a priest could distribute Communion. There were no extraordinary ministers.
I’m not trying to convert you to a society and practice for which many of you have absolutely no understanding. The past is water under the bridge. I attend a very reverent NO parish which is quite orthodox. But it is not what I grew up with.
Father has asked me and several other older choir members if we would be willing to form a Gregorian choir. I am assuming he is looking forward to possible actions by the Holy Father. If it means being able to resume the practices of my youth, I answer with a resounding, yes!
Look, I am not trying to “convert” any of you. Y’all want to bang on drums, strum electric guitars, wave your hands all about…be my guest. Just let those of us who remember…an opportunity to resume the faith we practised as children and to accept people of like minds. I really don’t see why a return to the TLM is causing such heart burn.
On another thread… reference was made to a Catholic parish in Tokyo. I googled the parish. They offer Masses in English, French, German, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Chinese…in 1965 it would have been one language - Latin which all Catholics would have understood. Think about that.
