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Megan7
Guest
Thanks.
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Megan7
Guest
Thanks for the link ProVobis
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ProVobis
Guest
You’re welcome. I just wanted to point out that there are sites other than the FSSP or FSSPX which use the term. Or maybe it’s just an Anglophone thing where there would be little chance they would be interested in a non-English Mass and it wouldn’t bother them, I don’t know. I don’t think if it would bother the Hispanic or Polish church-goer, for example. In fact one of those Paul VI’s Latin Masses is in a Polish-only church; they aren’t offended by the term, maybe because it’s in Latin, whereas “Ordinary Form” isn’t?Thanks for the link ProVobis
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shawnbm
Guest
I think I should reconsider what Traditional Catholicism means; obviously, it must be in keeping with the teachings of the magisterium and the historic orthodox faith of the Catholic Church. To me, it is a matter of emphasis in terms of certain rubrics and personal spiritual piety. Some of what I am reading above is indeed divisive, though, and we should reconsider the use of the title.
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pianistclare
Guest
Well said, JReducation. The best response, as have been your other posts. Agree agree agree.
The term "traditional " Catholic seems to have been hijacked to mean something that we are all uncomfortable with. Maybe that’s why people have those “misconceptions?”
Anyway, don’t want to start another round…just sayin.
Great post. Thank you for your insight.
Peace.
The term "traditional " Catholic seems to have been hijacked to mean something that we are all uncomfortable with. Maybe that’s why people have those “misconceptions?”
Anyway, don’t want to start another round…just sayin.
Great post. Thank you for your insight.
Peace.
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shawnbm
Guest
I say Amen to what JReducation wrote above on this page.
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kozlosap
Guest
I double down on that Amen for Bro JR! Without his continual good advise and ability to lay out true Church doctrine in a very concise and charitable manner, many of these threads would be a waste of time to participate in!
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JReducation
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ccmcmg
Guest
Perhaps the terms should be traditional…and Traditionalist, if we MUST have labels. I prefer ‘Catholic’. 
And ditto about JR…I sent him a fan letter here just the other day! LOL
And ditto about JR…I sent him a fan letter here just the other day! LOL
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EphelDuath
Guest
Au contraire, I do believe being very vocal about it will bring about some changes. This isn’t just an issue that was in the past; it’s still ongoing. A church near where I live still has altar rails but the pastor was considering tearing them down to look more like the other nearby churches. Our community had to virulently (and respectfully, before anybody snipes me) persuade him not to do such a thing.
That’s just an anecdote, but it is still true that there are many people – unfortunately including even bishops – that still follow a false interpretation of Vatican II which suggests religious indifferentism, a harrowing of all of the Roman rite’s traditions, and other such modernistic errors. This truly needs to be combated at every level; even Internet forums, since I know there are at least a few people on these forums that will eventually enter the seminary.
With all due respect (and I absolutely mean it), this is just an excuse to drop the discussion altogether.
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Sirach2
Guest
I hear you, Brother.
It seems appropriate here as we discuss this topic to remind our overzealous traditionalists of the teaching by St. Teresa of Avila, Doctor of the Church.14. There is another temptation—we ought to be aware of it, and be cautious in our conduct: persons are carried away by a zeal for virtue, through the pain which the sight of the sins and failings of others [and eveerything that concerns the Church] occasions them. Satan tells them that this pain arises only out of their desire that God may not be offended, and out of their anxiety about His honour; so they immediately seek to remedy the evil. This so disturbs them, that they cannot pray. The greatest evil of all is their thinking this an act of virtue, of perfection, and of a great zeal for God. I am not speaking of the pain which public sins occasion, if they be habitual in any community, nor of wrongs done to the Church, nor of heresies by which so many souls are visibly lost; for this pain is most wholesome, and being wholesome is no source of disquiet. *} The security, therefore, of that soul which would apply itself to prayer lies in casting away from itself all anxiety about persons and things, in taking care of itself, and in pleasing God. This is the most profitable course.
- If I were to speak of the mistakes which I have seen people make, in reliance on their own good intentions, I should never come to an end. Let us labour, therefore, always to consider the virtues and the good qualities which we discern in others, and with our own great sins cover our eyes, so that we may see none of their failings. This is one way of doing our work; and though we may not be perfect in it at once, we shall acquire one great virtue—we shall look upon all men as better than ourselves; and we begin to acquire that virtue in this way, by the grace of God, which is necessary in all things—for when we have it not, all our endeavours are in vain—and by imploring Him to give us this virtue; for He never fails us, if we do what we can.
{*} Note that wrongs done allegedly or actually to the Church does not cause any disquiet that many trads demonstrate, almost with an angst and vitriol at times, on this forum. It clearly shows their heart is not truly motivated by God, but by self-interest, and is considered by our Doctor to be a temptation. Hopefully, they will spend more time using their weapons of prayer, rather than their keyboard.
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JReducation
Guest
Allow me to show you what the problem is here and how I as an Ordinary myself, see this and deal with it.
I recently suspended two priests from our community for such language. There is a request in Rome for their immediate dismissal from the religious life and priesthood as well as a possible excommunication for defiance unbecoming a religious and a priest. If you’re encouraging seminarians, you’re going to get them into very serious trouble. I strongly recommend that you not help them so much.
I believe that art should not be destroyed gratuitously. But I also believe the great Spiritual Masters who have taught us the right way and the wrong way to approach authority. These words convey the wrong way. You may not be excommunicated, dismissed from a religious community or dismissed from the priesthood, but those who find themselves there, especially if they are part of an honest traditional community, will find themselves on the street. It is contrary to tradition for individuals or groups to wage war on Church authority.
If you notice the words that I highlighted in red, these are not words of peace. These are not words of someone who is sitting down with a pastor or a bishop and respectfully making a case to protect art forms that are part of our Catholic tradition. These are words of someone out to be wage war.
I recently suspended two priests from our community for such language. There is a request in Rome for their immediate dismissal from the religious life and priesthood as well as a possible excommunication for defiance unbecoming a religious and a priest. If you’re encouraging seminarians, you’re going to get them into very serious trouble. I strongly recommend that you not help them so much.
I believe that art should not be destroyed gratuitously. But I also believe the great Spiritual Masters who have taught us the right way and the wrong way to approach authority. These words convey the wrong way. You may not be excommunicated, dismissed from a religious community or dismissed from the priesthood, but those who find themselves there, especially if they are part of an honest traditional community, will find themselves on the street. It is contrary to tradition for individuals or groups to wage war on Church authority.
An excuse no, good advice from the great masters of Catholic Spirituality, yes. You may want to pick them up and read them. By the way, I don’t feel very respected when someone is accusing me of avoidance rather than asking me why or where this spirituality comes from. Not asking is probably a greater form of avoidance.
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EphelDuath
Guest
Interesting that you are now selectively highlighting words of a saint to justify your diagnosis of traditionalists as having “heartI hear you, Brother.
14. There is another temptation—we ought to be aware of it, and be cautious in our conduct: persons are carried away by a zeal for virtue, through the pain which the sight of the sins and failings of others [and eveerything that concerns the Church] occasions them. Satan tells them that this pain arises only out of their desire that God may not be offended, and out of their anxiety about His honour; so they immediately seek to remedy the evil. This so disturbs them, that they cannot pray. The greatest evil of all is their thinking this an act of virtue, of perfection, and of a great zeal for God. I am not speaking of the pain which public sins occasion, if they be habitual in any community, nor of wrongs done to the Church, nor of heresies by which so many souls are visibly lost; for this pain is most wholesome, and being wholesome is no source of disquiet. *} The security, therefore, of that soul which would apply itself to prayer lies in casting away from itself all anxiety about persons and things, in taking care of itself, and in pleasing God. This is the most profitable course.
- If I were to speak of the mistakes which I have seen people make, in reliance on their own good intentions, I should never come to an end. Let us labour, therefore, always to consider the virtues and the good qualities which we discern in others, and with our own great sins cover our eyes, so that we may see none of their failings. This is one way of doing our work; and though we may not be perfect in it at once, we shall acquire one great virtue—we shall look upon all men as better than ourselves; and we begin to acquire that virtue in this way, by the grace of God, which is necessary in all things—for when we have it not, all our endeavours are in vain—and by imploring Him to give us this virtue; for He never fails us, if we do what we can.
{*} Note that wrongs done allegedly or actually to the Church does not cause any disquiet that many trads demonstrate, almost with an angst and vitriol at times, on this forum. It clearly shows their heart is not truly motivated by God, but by self-interest, and is considered by our Doctor to be a temptation. Hopefully, they will spend more time using their weapons of prayer, rather than their keyboard.
So please once more, cease telling us about how “wrongs done allegedly or actually to the Church does not cause any disquiet” to us. That is a judgment of the heart. I would strongly advocate bringing up this issue with your spiritual adviser in the OCDS.
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EphelDuath
Guest
Perhaps you could have also highlighted the part where I noted that it was done respectfully.
Our community was very strongly against the pastor’s proposed change, but we did not “wage war” or anything like that.
What attitude or disposition they have is not up to me. I hope they act in Christ in all things. My goal is much more modest, which is just to make clear what Vatican II actually said. What people do about that is not my business. I pray they will fight the good fight for the greater glory of God in all things.
Again, I did not wage war against church authority. It would be one thing if we flooded our bishop’s office with angry letters about what our pastor was doing or made solemn demands with him. Rather we discussed how important such things were to us and the Church as a whole with our pastor, and he agreed.
I understand as a religious superior that it’s your job to pick up on the subtleties such as peoples’ word choices in order to understand and correct their attitudes, and by no means is it my place to tell you wrong. But I do believe you have misunderstood my intent.
Again, with all due respect Brother. I am quite exhausted with how me and those likeminded to myself are treated. We do exactly what the Holy Father tells us, his venerable predecessors have told us, and what the Council has promulgated, and we are frequently accused of having uncharitable attitudes, opposing authority, or even promoting schism. I mean, in this thread alone I’ve had my own words misquoted and used to attack my motives when I have done so such thing to anybody else.
I am obeying the Holy Church the best I can – not as humble as I could be, which is a problem I admit. I am not perfect. Regardless, I think it eminently unfair that every sentence that a traditionalists writes or says in public is probed so scathingly for any signs at all of uncharitableness or dissent. It is always an excuse to write off what we are saying. And so asking if we are drawing too much attention to ourselves seems very clear to me to be just another way of ignoring what we are saying and focusing on our persons. What have we done that’s so offensive? Either I’m a Lefevbrite or a bad Christian – why? because I quote the Council that’s been so abusively misquoted for decades?
Look, I completely understand that you have many concerns beyond chant or Latin or the EF. I am in no way criticizing you for this. But these are great concerns to others. And so instead of evaluating if we are being good Christians based off of a few impersonal statements we’ve made on an Internet forum seems to me to be extremely unfair.
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Sirach2
Guest
Not going to address your posts, EphelDuath, as I previously stated. They are filled with judgments against individuals and misconceptions of what the Church teaches, promulgated as your dogma. Your own signature now proves what I stated in previous responses to you.
Counting 5, 4, 3, …
The issue is that you want to fight against those things which are licit in the Church and are encouraging others to join you by your incessant drum beat here.
Counting 5, 4, 3, …
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Oneofthewomen
Guest
You beat me to it Sirach2!!!
EP- sorry to say, but your posts in this thread just prove that the reason many “traditional Catholics” feel that they are marginalized, is because you marginalize yourselves. Everything this in your signature you want to “save” is a discipline, not a dogma. Maybe if you and others like you could see that your way is not the only one, and stop judging and disparaging others who see things differently, yet are still in line with the Church, there might not be so many misconceptions about so called “traditional Catholics.”
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RPRPsych
Guest
Reading through this thread, one thing I’ve realized is that one man’s misconception is another man’s reality.
All I can say is that if I’d encountered some of these attitudes at a particular point in my life, four years ago, I’d probably be a Lutheran by now.
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EphelDuath
Guest
More attacks on my person. I am getting very tired of this.
What judgments have I made against individuals? You have said that traditionalists are not disquieted by attacks against the Church, and we are not really focused on God but self-interested. When have I said anything like that about you? Show me. I have asked that you stop misquoting me or misattributing beliefs to me that I don’t hold, but I have not called you judgmental, or a bad Christian, or anything like that.
What is my dogma? My dogma is to be aligned entirely with the Church in all things. That includes things that many people don’t want to admit the Church has said, such as that Gregorian chant holds the principle place in the Roman liturgy.
What am I fighting against? Liturgical abuses, yes. But nothing that is licit. I point out where the Church considers those things to be permitted but not ideal, and that won’t change unless you demonstrate me wrong.
So please. For the fourth or fifth time I ask: stop attacking my person. I don’t do that to you. I haven’t done that to anyone. I don’t know what I have done that has warranted a collective Internet judgment of my soul but please stop.
God bless.
J
JReducation
Guest
What you want to do is good and laudable. But you need to expunge certain language out of it. That’s the problem. This is why I strongly recommend, beyond the popes, that peple, not just you, read works like:
The Admonitions of St. Francis
The Way of Perfection by Teresa of Avila
The Third Spiritual Alphabet by Francisco de Osuna
Introduction to the Devout Life by Francis de Sales
Development of Christian Doctrine by John Henry Newman
Living in the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence
The Itinerarium ad Mentis Dei by Bonaventure
Rule of St. Benedict
The Autobiography of John Bosco
These men and women have taught us how to obey the Church, how to speak to the Church, how to speak about the Church, when to speak and when to be quiet.
We have many people in the traditionalist circle with the best ideas and best intentions, but they need to polish their method.
I saw that wrote “politely” in parenthesis, but you had all those other terms in your statement. If you had said politely and left out the rest, I would have given you my complete support. I too hate the unreasonable destruction of beauty.
But more important than a communion rail is the reverence due to authority. Christ did not die for communion rails. He did not assume the nature of a communion rail. He did die for humanity and assumed human nature. In doing so, he elevated human dignity. That dignity must never be violated, even when it’s wrong or misinformed. To do so is to act contrary to the mystery of the Incarnation.
In Evangelium Vitae, Bl. John Paul reminds us that all human beings are redeemed and dignified by Christ. We must never forget that in our dialogue with others. In Pastore Dado Vobis, he reminds us that Christ has given us pastors to guide us and for us to venerate. We must humbly ask that they guide us, avoiding all language that may induce us to treat them with any less reverence. This is true for you, me and everyone else.
Maybe I’m being too hard on you and if so, I apologize. You’re right. As superior, I am very attentive to language, because language transmits ideas and feelings, they’re not always positive. I am sincere when I ask you not to try to influence those who are going to enter the religious life, the priesthood or both. Unless you know how that person is going to take what you say and the consequences, you may be doing that person harm.
The two men in question in this case are good men. But they picked up language form a given culture and after a while that language took on a life of its own. When corrected, they failed to back down. This seems to be happening a lot lately. We had crazy liberals doing this. Now we seem to have both liberals and traditionalists being disrespectful and belligerent. Religious life and priesthood are changing. We’re becoming less tolerant of mouthiness. This is a good thing. We’re raising a generation of priests and religious who are submissive, discreet, and open to dialogue rather than confrontation. We have had enough of mouthy religious and priests. The democratic days are over. They either do as they’re told or they are sent home. The bishop (for the secular clergy) and the religious superior (for religious brothers and secular priests) has the last word. His word is the voice of Christ and it’s not up for discussion once he says the conversation is over. This is part of the return to tradition. Those who want to continue the discussion can do so outside.
Please be careful. We never know the ideas that we put into the heads of seminarians and novices nor how they will run with them. If we want good priests, brothers and sisters, we must encourage them to learn to obey.
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EphelDuath
Guest
Thank you for your kind response. I was beginning to fear that this entire thread would devolve from misconceptions about traditonalists, into how bad or shallow my attitude or beliefs are. So your considerate and fair response means a lot to me.
I do agree that sometimes traditionalists lose sight of the bigger picture, but that’s a problem for the individual, not the movement as a whole. What the movement advocates is very much in line with what the Church teaches. While I don’t think I or others have ever been so distracted by this that we now think Christ died for communion rails, it is true that sometimes we get caught up in the “less important” because generally it’s less recognized and, unfairly, more vilified than what’s “more important”.
I have never once tried to encourage disobedience or disrespect of one’s superior. You’ll see that if you go to the (now closed) thread where the poster was saying he was justified in dissenting from the Pope if he goes against tradition, which I strongly disagreed with. Just because I passionately fight for the Church does not mean I fight the Church passionately. I get endlessly frustrated when people fail to distinguish between the two. My community fought to keep our communion rails, and we did so respectfully and calmly – but due to common misconceptions of traditionalists, all that will be read there is “my community fought”, as if to fight is synonymous with to rebel or sow discord.
Truly too much time is spent probing the disposition of traditionalists, while ignoring what they say. THAT’S what I cannot stand and frustrates me endlessly. And people do stupid things when they’re frustrated, sometimes – I apologize if I have come across as uncharitable to any other posters here.
God bless
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