Voices of Moderate Catholicism and the Liturgical Reforms

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I agree that the Holy Spirit guided Vatican II, as do most here I think (and hope). It was an Ecumenical Council after all.

However, the reforms of the mass are not actual documents from the Council. They certainly are not infallible. If liturgical reforms that proceeded as a result of Vatican II were infallible, then they would not have been able to reform the mass in the 60s and 70s in the first place, as the Tridentine rite which proceeded from the Council of Trent would have been infallible and therefore unchangeable.

So it is totally fair to critique aspects of the Ordinary Form, just like it was fair for people to critique aspects of the Extraordinary Form in the 60s. And that is what I made this post for; discussing the growing skepticism towards some of the changes they made. I did not intend for it to become a thread bashing the council itself.
 
I had a Latin-English missal. But it was not always easy to follow the priest because he was praying the Latin in a low voice. Sometimes I got behind. Still, the missal was helpful. It still is, because it’s easy for the mind to wander even when the Mass is in English.
 
What reforms are you referring to? Please be specific. Here were the actual reforms:
  1. Priest facing the people.
  2. Speaking in the vernacular.
  3. The 1962 Missal was still valid until other missals were issued later.
 
Dovekin said:
In the US, the Liturgical movement had spread a desire for participation. Missals for individuals started being published probably after WW2. The benefits of that participation were acknowledged and codified at Vatican 2 because it was not universal.
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Speaking of “universal”, Pope and Saint John XXIII , who opened Vatican 2 affirmed that a non-vernacular (Latin) language is required due to the universal nature of Church
POPE JOHN XXIII: For the Church, precisely because it embraces all nations and is destined to endure to the end of time … of its very nature requires a language which is universal, immutable, and non-vernacular.
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Dovekin said:
Prior to the Council, there was little encouragement to “stay with the priest.” Iirc there was little effort expended on following t
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Dovekin said:
Do you think that was the situation everywhere?
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the post says “little encouragement” not “little encouragement everywhere”

“everywhere” is an impossible standard, even today’s missal fails on that standard, since some church somewhere people don’t have today’s missal and aren’t following the mass.
 
There are many things they changed. Honestly, the more you look into, the more you question the logic of some of the reformers. Obviously, everyone will have a different taste in liturgy, but generally the reforms were focused on simplifying everything to very high degree.

Some of these are:
-the removal of Septuagesima (the pre-Lent season), which is something that actually united us with our Eastern brethren, who still have a parallel season
-the removal of the Octave of Pentecost, one of the highest feast days in the Church
-the complete, for lack of a better word, gutting of the Offertory of the mass. They removed or highly modified at least 7 or 8 of the prayers which expressed our theology on the Eucharist quite well.
-the removal, or extreme simplification, of the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar

Just all off the top of my head. The mindset of the time was “simplify everything for a more pure version of the mass”. That mindset was taken to the extreme, I would contend.
 
edwest211 said:
The truth matters - not opinions.
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Yet here we are, swapping opinions, speculation, and theories. I mentioned 1 Corinthians 12 earlier. Another practical passage is found in Philippians 2.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
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The only thing that matters for most Catholics is what the Mass is like where they attend. Sometimes that means allowing for that which is best for others first, while humbly accepting that which one may not prefer.
 
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edwest211 said:
The US was no more ready to do anything in 1960 than at any other time. This is the calendar fallacy I see too often here
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You’re saying that anti-Catholicism wasn’t a problem earlier in our nation’s history? You’re saying that the social upheaval that came in the 1960s and afterwards had nothing to do with WWI and WWII? I beg to differ.

If you want to argue that we would not have had WWI and WWII without of the work of modernist, communist and nihilist philosophers, I can buy that. Having said that, just as I don’t think we’d have the excesses of labor unions if we hadn’t had grossly unjust employers in the first place, I also don’t think the communists would have gotten the foothold they got if the so-called upper classes had been Christian towards those kept in the lower classes. What goes around, comes around. When this kind of situation exists in a culture that proclaims itself to be Christian or to be Catholic, it becomes the kind of situation that puts idealists off the rails into grossly wrong-headed ways of thinking.
 
I have actual history to back up everything I’ve written. I know there are some who want to hide what actually happened and why.
 
edwest211 said:
I know there are some who want to hide what actually happened and why.
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I probably have heard most of the points that people have made on the subject, and the conspiracy theories that surround them. I also know that “evidence” is different than truth and facts. I really do not care one way or another.
There is a lot we can do locally, even a little bit some can do about the liturgy, that will build up the kingdom.
 
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edwest211 said:
Western society did not attack itself. Marriage, family, children – all of that was attacked and distorted by strangers who hate normal life.
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That’s a little simplistic. First off, what do you mean by “strangers”? People who didn’t grow up in familes? People who weren’t from Western countries? What qualifies someone as a “stranger” and what do you mean by hating “normal life”?
 
No. Only the Church is in charge. No one else. And Catholics need to know the facts about how we got from Vatican II to today.

Hosea 4:6:

New International Version
my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. "Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children.

New Living Translation
My people are being destroyed because they don’t know me. Since you priests refuse to know me, I refuse to recognize you as my priests. Since you have forgotten the laws of your God, I will forget to bless your children.

English Standard Version
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.
 
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I’m not sure what this has to do with anything.

It is true that a lot can be done on the local level because there are options within the rubrics that, when exercised, completely change the tenor of the mass.
 
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I do not think Hosea had ecclesial history in mind, but rather the moral law.
 
Please. Study history. World War I? What about it? I specialize in World War II history. I also specialize in the lies and deceit that occurred after the war.

The fiction being pedaled here is just that. Oh yes. Newspaper stories from the period. And real history. Show the attacks made against John Kennedy: “If he’s elected he’s going to take orders from the Pope!” But he was elected. Richard Nixon went down in flames.

And politics? I know it. I think it’s useless to follow as a god. The worship of Communism and/or Marxism shows the folly of men following fallible men.
 
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