Traditionalism V Conservatism

[AltarEnthusiast]

I agree with the above comments about conservatives taking everything that comes out of Rome as dogmatic even though the Church, herself, does say that loyal Catholics can disagree with the prudential judgement in these matters. What I think we need to understand is that while we may pray for an end to things like Communion in the Hand, Altar Girls, Mass said versus populum, etc…, we must not fail to recognize Rome’s authority to make these decisions, and we must be measured in our public criticisms of these decisions.

We must not become Ultramontanists.

Is that only true for items that one personally deems to be “traditional” or “conservative” or does it apply to all such matters even if that are deemed to be “progressive?”

 

[GerardP]

While it’s problematic to apply political labels to the Church under any circumstance, I believe thee is a problem with your comment.

First, so-called “traditionalists” do seem to be of the right and many times, the far right in all my experiences within the Church. This may be only by practice and not design, but it’s been my experience all of the time.

I think perhaps the term “orthodox” is more appropriate? I have seen both left and right wing Catholics who are also extremely orthodox.

By what standard of measurement do you determine “far right”?

Traditionalists will always be to the “right” because Liberals always move further to the left and “conservatives” get dragged to the “left” because they don’t want to be considered “far right” or “extremists” So, by compromising with the left they consistently give ground.

Traditionalists stand anchored to unmoving truth. Conservatives are simply one side of a liberal coin. The slow lane if you will on the Liberal Highway.

 

[Windmill]

Is that only true for items that one personally deems to be “traditional” or “conservative” or does it apply to all such matters even if that are deemed to be “progressive?”

Define “items”.

De fide tenets of the faith are not items up for debate. Catholic teachings that carry the weight of the Ordinary Magisterium of the Church are not up for debate (eg: immorality of contraception, male-only priesthood). The items we are discussing here are those things that are not definitions of the Faith or of morals. So, before answering your question, we’d have to define what specific items you are talking about.

Liberals are not heterodox if they accept the articles of faith that Catholics are required to believe. Once they deny these things, they cease to be Catholic.

 

[GerardP]

Liberals are not heterodox if they accept the articles of faith that Catholics are required to believe. Once they deny these things, they cease to be Catholic.

While we’re at it, we’re going to have to define what is meant by liberals. Since liberalism as defined by the Church has been condemned.

Here’s an article delineating the differences between liberals, modernists and progressivists.

traditioninaction.org/HotTopics/f004ht_Liberal_Modernist_Progressive.htm

 

[cam100]

We must not become Ultramontanists.

I don’t understand this comment. From your linked source, I quote:

A term used to denote integral and active Catholicism, because it recognizes as its spiritual head the pope, who, for the greater part of Europe, is a dweller beyond the mountains (ultra montes), that is, beyond the Alps.

…those who combat Ultramontanis are in fact combating Catholicism…

So how is Ultramontanism bad? It sounds like we SHOULD be Ultramontanists.

 

[Deusdonat]

I would say these are merely unnecessary terms which are at best confusing and at worst divisive. Witness the one comment “I would say that the Traditionalist dissents from the current magisterial teaching in adherence to past small “t” traditions thinking that they are intrisically linked to the big “T” Traditions of the Church.”

There is NOTHING LESS traditional (or Traditional if you like) than dissenting from the church. Those who dissent are by definition NOT “traditional” but schismatic or heretic. The same is of course true for the opposite end of the spectrum.

I guess my question is this: why do you feel compelled to label yourself? Why not simply be a Catholic? Personally, I am Catholic, attend the Tridentine mass which I find superior to the NO for a host of reasons. This is not dissent, this is just sound theology and aesthetics. I have never said the NO or the eucharistic consecration is invalid. Whether that makes me conservative, Traditional, Traditionalist, Tridentine, TradCath, Trichinosic or whatever is irrelevant. I am and will always remain simply Catholic.

 

[Windmill]

I don’t understand this comment. From your linked source, I quote:

So how is Ultramontanism bad? It sounds like we SHOULD be Ultramontanists.

Ah, thanks for the chance to revisit this. I had the chance to review that link, and it is not what I was intending. The term has been used in different ways throughout the centuries, and I was familiar with a different usage than what the link describes.

Disregard it.

My point was to say that in matters of discipline, the Pope is not infallible (even though his authority should be heeded, we aren’t required to agree with every action he takes). As Brennan later said, quoting von Hildebrand, “We obey, but we disagree.” To say that that disagreement is heterodoxy is to place the authority of the Pope higher than Catholic teaching places it.

 

[AltarEnthusiast]

By what standard of measurement do you determine “far right”?

Traditionalists will always be to the “right” because Liberals always move further to the left and “conservatives” get dragged to the “left” because they don’t want to be considered “far right” or “extremists” So, by compromising with the left they consistently give ground.

Traditionalists stand anchored to unmoving truth. Conservatives are simply one side of a liberal coin. The slow lane if you will on the Liberal Highway.

I would suggest that traditionalists that are to the extreme right have most in common with whatever group (name?) is furthest to the left. They are not far apart. In fact, they couldn’t be closer.

You can’t go any further on the right without eventually slamming into the left. The reverse is true as well. Both extremes are saturated with dissent.

 

[AltarEnthusiast]

There is NOTHING LESS traditional (or Traditional if you like) than dissenting from the church. Those who dissent are by definition NOT “traditional” but schismatic or heretic. The same is of course true for the opposite end of the spectrum.

I agree that the labels can really be a bad thing. It is best to consider oneself a Catholic Christian and leave it at that. Your definition is however faulty. Many, many Catholics who meet the definition of “traditional” are also terrible dissenters.

To internally feel that one Mass better nourishes one than the other is fine – it’s great. To proclaim that one Mass is superior to another is to show dissent.

 

[Brennan_Doherty]

I agree that the labels can really be a bad thing. It is best to consider oneself a Catholic Christian and leave it at that. Your definition is however faulty. Many, many Catholics who meet the definition of “traditional” are also terrible dissenters.

To internally feel that one Mass better nourishes one than the other is fine – it’s great. To proclaim that one Mass is superior to another is to show dissent.

Dissent from what?

 

[Deusdonat]

I agree that the labels can really be a bad thing. It is best to consider oneself a Catholic Christian and leave it at that. Your definition is however faulty. Many, many Catholics who meet the definition of “traditional” are also terrible dissenters.

Or maybe you just don’t understand their point of view and are dismissing them as “dissenting” for expressing an opinion.

To internally feel that one Mass better nourishes one than the other is fine – it’s great. To proclaim that one Mass is superior to another is to show dissent.

Case in point. I can claim that the Tridentine mass is aesthetically, musically and tastefully superior to the Novus Ordo. That may mean dissent in your world, but you have no basis to judge my allegiance to the One True church other than your own prejudice.

 

[GerardP]

I would suggest that traditionalists that are to the extreme right have most in common with whatever group (name?) is furthest to the left. They are not far apart. In fact, they couldn’t be closer.

You can’t go any further on the right without eventually slamming into the left. The reverse is true as well. Both extremes are saturated with dissent.

That simply doesn’t hold when one looks at the facts. The most “right wing” traditionalists of the sedevacantist stripe are most similar in viewpoint to the conservatives. They have a mistaken notion about the guarantees of the Church in regards to the Pope.

This is why often neo-conservative Catholics often say that the sedevacantists are at least consistent in their logic compared to the SSPX. That’s only because conservatives and sedes have erroneous ideas about obedience, governance and the protections of the Holy Spirit in the Church.

Liberals in the political sense are for all intents and purposes heretics. So, they really shouldn’t even factor into the equation.

Sedevacantists and conservatives are the extremes and Traditionalists are on the firm ground of tradition, believing what was always believed by all everywhere.

 

[eelpis]

latinmassmagazine.com/articles/articles_2001_SP_Ripperger.html

This is a good article of an FSSP priest who explains the differences. In sum: the “old” Magisterium was simple and clear for all to understand The “new” less easy to understand and more words, and it’s really up to the Magisterium to show the continuity of faith pre and post VII and not the task of the laity.

"As the theological community began to unravel before, during and after Vatican II, those who considered themselves orthodox were those who were obedient and intellectually submissive to the Magisterium, since those who dissented were not orthodox. Therefore the standard of orthodoxy was shifted from Scripture, intrinsic tradition (of which the Magisterium is a part) and extrinsic tradition (which includes magisterial acts of the past, such as Pius IX’s Syllabus of Errors), to a psychological state in which only the current Magisterium is followed.

Neoconservatives have fallen into this way of thinking. The only standard by which they judge orthodoxy is whether or not one follows the current Magisterium. As a general rule, traditionalists tend to be orthodox in the sense that they are obedient to the current Magisterium, even though they disagree about matters of discipline and have some reservations about certain aspects of current magisterial teachings that seem to contradict the previous Magisterium (e.g., the role of the ecumenical movement). Traditionalists tend to take not just the current Magisterium as their norm but also Scripture, intrinsic tradition, extrinsic tradition and the current Magisterium as the principles of judgment of correct Catholic thinking. This is what distinguishes traditionalists and neoconservatives"

 

[bear06]

So, traditionalists will critique the Novus Ordo while conservatives won’t (although conservatives will criticize liturgical abuses).

This goes for other things such as communion in the hand. Traditionalists will criticize that decision and argue that it was a bad idea to allow it. Conservatives will defend the decision because it was allowed by the Vatican.

Wrong. Fr. Fessio,who’d probably be a conservative by your standards - he’s definitely not a traditionalist, critiques quite a bit. That said, he does so in the light of tradtion, Tradition and charity which is contrary to most radical traditionalist (please note the distinction in radical and regular traditionalists) “critiques”.

 

[Brennan_Doherty]

Wrong. Fr. Fessio,who’d probably be a conservative by your standards - he’s definitely not a traditionalist, critiques quite a bit. That said, he does so in the light of tradtion, Tradition and charity which is contrary to most radical traditionalist (please note the distinction in radical and regular traditionalists) “critiques”.

I agree with most your assessment of Fr. Fessio, and I greatly appreciate some of his writings and have linked to at least one article of his on the liturgy (I haven’t read all of his writings).

While traditionalists may not fully agree with Fr. Fessio’s solution to the liturgical issues, I would say his actual critique of the Novus Ordo echo those of traditionalists. Thus in that sense I would not consider him a typical conservative.

I also appreciate that he is willing to publish traditionalist critiques of the New Mass such as “The Heresy of of Formlessness” or “Reform of the Reform” which has essays in it by traditionalists.

I don’t know who you are referring to when you use the term “radical traditionalist.”

I can say that the traditionalist writings I refer people to also critique the Novus Ordo in the light of tradition and charity (mixed with some bluntness). By this I mean people such as Dietrich von Hildebrand, Dr. William Marra, Cardinal Ottaviani, Dom Alcuin Reid, Fr. Aidan Nichols, etc. Again, in fact, some of the most significant traditionalist writings I would refer people to are published by Ignatius Press.