Was The OF Created By Protestants?

[Portrait]

Hi again OraLabora,

Something else occurred to me since my earlier reply to you. (note that I do fully accept the logic in your point above).

How about comparing the vitality of traditional organisations (say SSPX and FSSP) with the ‘mainstream’ (if you will) church.

France is expected to ordain 76 priests in total in 2013
dici.org/en/news/france-96-diocesan-priests-ordained-this-year/

“England and Wales” is expected to ordain 30 priests in 2013.
cathnews.com/article.aspx?aeid=31857

These are pretty low figures. About 35 million French people in the modern day are Catholic. France has fallen from ordaining ~1000 priests per year in the 1950s, to less than 100 per year now.

And while Catholics are a minority of ~5 million in England and Wales, see how the link provided excitedly raves about a mere 30 ordinations. (though of course, as it a rising figure, I do not dispute this is good news).

In contrast, look at the comparatively miniscule, (compared to the Catholic populations of the nations above), traditionalist organisations performance:

The FSSP (a small, fully canonical priestly organisation of just 236 ordained priests; HQ in Rome (I think)):

Since 2001, they have ordained an average of 12 men per year.
fssp.org/en/chiffres.htm

The SSPX (trad group with just less than 1,000,000 worshippers; HQ in Switzerland)

Since 1999, they have ordained approximately 20 men per year (I worked it out as 19.7 )
sspx.org/miscellaneous/sspx_statistics_12-21-2012/sspx_statistics_12-20-2012.htm

These figures compare very favourably indeed with the mainstream Church in western European nations, especially when you consider the traditional groups are like specks of dust, size wise, compared to the large Catholic populations mentioned.

If they were multiplied, pro-rata, for some equivalence in size of the potential pool of vocations,they would most comprehensively eclipse the numbers of novus ordo ordinations.

So while I take your point that, at the time of Vatican II, there was a very high degree of social flux which also must have had some influence on religion in society - meaning it is hard to isolate the effect of liturgical change for analysis - how do you explain the very noticeable different in modern vitality, in terms of priestly vocations, of the traditional groups compared top the novus ordo Church?

What is it that these groups are doing differently, apart from the obvious?
How do you explain their comparative success?

Given the ageing priesthood in many western nations is facing a desperate crisis of new recruits, if I were a Bishop, looking at these figures, I would be screaming for the traditional way of doing things.

Dear GWright,

Cordial greetings and a very good day. Thankyou for your (name removed by moderator)ut on this thread.

Undoubtedly, the Catholic Church everywhere in the English-speaking world is now very different from the Church of the 1950’s. Of course change is inevitable and one must move with the times, but surely change can only be warmly welcomed and embraced if it is change for the better. The biggest changes have come from outside pressures, for example the contraceptive pill, the increasing acceptance of homosexual vice, and the consequent permissive revolution of the Sixties, the coursening of standards and much hostile legistlation. Notwithstanding these grave external problems, the fact is that many Catholic communities have also been guilty of self-harm by ignorantly encouraging the secularization of institutions. When the reforms of Vatican II were imposed, unexpected consequences ensued, especially when leaders were naive and optimistic and underestimated the virulence of godless hostile forces, whilst overestimating Catholic vitality and influence.

Sadly, dear friend, we now have situations which are, undeniably, historically novel, indeed most bizarre. Some putative Catholics still insist on calling themselves Catholic when they reject most of our Church’s teachings on life, marriage and homosexual acts of depravity etc. and regard the Pope and Bishops as hindrances (or irrelevant) to their modernizing liberal agenda. The Church, as G.K. Chesterton said, should have stability when everything else is changing, which is jolly obvious really, since God’s truth is not subject to change or modification.

There should, dear friend, be no misguided men within Holy Mother Church, established upon the rock of St. Peter and its holy teachings guaranteed by the presence of the Holy Spirit. That Church has unity and universality from the first day of Pentecost. False teachers of one sort or another have unrelentlessly tried to divide the family of faith and this fact is at the very centre of the present crisis within the Church. Without controversy, liberal Bishops, priests and religious have done irreparable harm to our beloved Church by any means at their disposal, short of kicking over the traces completely and being censured by Rome. Even among ‘conservative’ Catholics, who are mostly orthodox on faith and morals, there is an attempt to accommodate Christ’s holy religion to contemporary culture so as to make it and the Church supposedly more ‘credible’ and ‘relevant’. This is nothing short of a shameless compromise with the godless world and only serves to hinder the true mission of the Church.

These are, dear friend, very troublous times for Holy Mother Church, for sure.

God bless.

Warmest good wishes,

Portrait

Pax

 

[JReducation]

Br JR, nonetheless at least one or two websites call the translation rather “curious.” I suppose at the time Henry VIII mandated it, there were other, arguably better English versions, but Henry’s was accepted as gospel truth so I’ll let it go at that.

One can always polish it up, so that it does not sound clunky; which was the complaint. The Anglican translation was not very polished. I’m not sure how much one would want to polish it up without running the risk of changing the original meaning. The Latin translation is not an literal translation either. I would call it a precise translation, meaning that it gets as close to the original as possible in the Latin language. The Semitic languages are very hard to translate into European languages, hence the many problems with the bible.

Well, checking the number of English speakers and their religions, I would say it’s not much of a Catholic language either.

That’s my point. Languages belong to a particular culture, not a particular faith.

In looking at the mass, we need to look objectively and see that the English is not the problem, because English is the language of many people, including Catholics and non Catholics, just as Latin and Greek were the languages of Christians and non-Christians.

French, Spanish, Italian Romanian, Portuguese are languages spoken by Catholic nations. However, the same people who object to English, because it’s Protestant also object to the Romance languages, which are mostly spoken by Catholics. What they should really say is that they object to the use of ethnic languages.

However, if we say that, then we have a problem with the Eastern Catholics. Their liturgical languages are ethnic languages. It would be unreasonable to say that it is Catholic for 22 Churches to use ethnic languages, but it is Protestant for the Latin Church to use the languages of Europe or the indigenous languages of the Southern Hemisphere.

One can argue that the Latin language has been the liturgical language of the Latin Church. This is historically true. However, the Church has not prohibited to use of Latin in the Ordinary Form. In fact, it’s used quite often in major liturgical celebrations where many nations are gathered such as WYDs, apostolic visitations, televised masses on EWTN and other places. It’s not banned. It’s a choice made by the presider, a choice that he has the right to make. Church law grants him that right. I believe that we need to stop fighting Church law.

There are unjust laws in the Church and the world, but this is not one of them. This law gives someone a right, it does not violate a right. For a law to be unjust, it has to violate a human right or a civil right under the law.

We must all be careful not to fall into the sin of nitpicking, almost as if one is looking for a fault, rather than pointing out a true and glaring problem.

 

[JReducation]

Dear GWright,

Cordial greetings and a very good day. Thankyou for your (name removed by moderator)ut on this thread.

Undoubtedly, the Catholic Church everywhere in the English-speaking world is now very different from the Church of the 1950’s. Of course change is inevitable and one must move with the times, but surely change can only be warmly welcomed and embraced if it is change for the better. The biggest changes have come from outside pressures, for example the contraceptive pill, the increasing acceptance of homosexual vice, and the consequent permissive revolution of the Sixties, the coursening of standards and much hostile legistlation. Notwithstanding these grave external problems, the fact is that many Catholic communities have also been guilty of self-harm by ignorantly encouraging the secularization of institutions. When the reforms of Vatican II were imposed, unexpected consequences ensued, especially when leaders were naive and optimistic and underestimated the virulence of godless hostile forces, whilst overestimating Catholic vitality and influence.

Sadly, dear friend, we now have situations which are, undeniably, historically novel, indeed most bizarre. Some putative Catholics still insist on calling themselves Catholic when they reject most of our Church’s teachings on life, marriage and homosexual acts of depravity etc. and regard the Pope and Bishops as hindrances (or irrelevant) to their modernizing liberal agenda. The Church, as G.K. Chesterton said, should have stability when everything else is changing, which is jolly obvious really, since God’s truth is not subject to change or modification.

There should, dear friend, be no misguided men within Holy Mother Church, established upon the rock of St. Peter and its holy teachings guaranteed by the presence of the Holy Spirit. That Church has unity and universality from the first day of Pentecost. False teachers of one sort or another have unrelentlessly tried to divide the family of faith and this fact is at the very centre of the present crisis within the Church. Without controversy, liberal Bishops, priests and religious have done irreparable harm to our beloved Church by any means at their disposal, short of kicking over the traces completely and being censured by Rome. Even among ‘conservative’ Catholics, who are mostly orthodox on faith and morals, there is an attempt to accommodate Christ’s holy religion to contemporary culture so as to make it and the Church supposedly more ‘credible’ and ‘relevant’. This is nothing short of a shameless compromise with the godless world and only serves to hinder the true mission of the Church.

These are, dear friend, very troublous times for Holy Mother Church, for sure.

God bless.

Warmest good wishes,

Portrait

Pax

Whoah!

The picture is not that bleak. As the Holy Father said just recently. While the picture in Europe is very dire and maybe in North America as well, the picture in South America, Africa and Asia is very good. He said that in 2011, these countries reported 17 million conversions. He also said that while the number of priests is dropping, there is also a good reason for this. The number of religious brothers in Asia, Africa and South America is increasing exponentially. They have given birth to many new religious communities of religious men. They don’t ordain for very practical reasons. There is a surplus ordained religious. The number of deacons is overwhelming. The number of lay movements faithful to Catholic thought is bigger than ever. You may want to read Light of the World in which the Holy Father addresses these points. In recent months he spoke about one of the causes being the extremes in the Northern Hemisphere, both political and religious.

We have to be careful not to talk ourselves into despondency. That would not be very good. What we need to do filter out the problems in the northern hemisphere from the universal Church.

I would add that the problems of faith in the northern hemisphere are not unique to Catholicism. One reason that the Anglican Church keeps changing its position on so many key issues is its desperate attempt to stay afloat. Orthodox Anglicanism is on a downfall. But the more they try to compensate, the faster the downfall. Compensating is not the answer.

We have to examine how we do evangelization in the northern hemisphere. Whatever we’re doing, does not work or we’re not doing enough of it.

 

[ProVobis]

We must all be careful not to fall into the sin of nitpicking, almost as if one is looking for a fault, rather than pointing out a true and glaring problem.

Br JR, I don’t think it’s nitpicking. Dom Gueranger in his Liturgical Institutions wrote in 1840:

Hatred for the Latin language is inborn in the heart of all the enemies of Rome. They recognize it as the bond of Catholics throughout the universe, as the arsenal of orthodoxy against all the subtleties of the sectarian spirit . . . We must admit it is a master blow of Protestantism to have declared war on the sacred language. If it should ever succeed in destroying it, it would be well on the way to victory.

 

[Cristiano]

Br JR, I don’t think it’s nitpicking. Dom Gueranger in his Liturgical Institutions wrote in 1840:

1840 vs. 2013 The development of languages and communication is at a completely different stage now. I think that taking that language statement as independent of time is quite risky. Today improper use of mass media is more of a risk than a difference in language (e.g. the use of the term Catholic in the National Catholic Reporter, Catholics for Choice etc.).

 

[TimothyH]

Whoah!

The picture is not that bleak. As the Holy Father said just recently. While the picture in Europe is very dire and maybe in North America as well, the picture in South America, Africa and Asia is very good. He said that in 2011, these countries reported 17 million conversions. He also said that while the number of priests is dropping, there is also a good reason for this. The number of religious brothers in Asia, Africa and South America is increasing exponentially. They have given birth to many new religious communities of religious men. They don’t ordain for very practical reasons. There is a surplus ordained religious. The number of deacons is overwhelming. The number of lay movements faithful to Catholic thought is bigger than ever. You may want to read Light of the World in which the Holy Father addresses these points. In recent months he spoke about one of the causes being the extremes in the Northern Hemisphere, both political and religious.

We have to be careful not to talk ourselves into despondency. That would not be very good. What we need to do filter out the problems in the northern hemisphere from the universal Church.

I would add that the problems of faith in the northern hemisphere are not unique to Catholicism. One reason that the Anglican Church keeps changing its position on so many key issues is its desperate attempt to stay afloat. Orthodox Anglicanism is on a downfall. But the more they try to compensate, the faster the downfall. Compensating is not the answer.

We have to examine how we do evangelization in the northern hemisphere. Whatever we’re doing, does not work or we’re not doing enough of it.

I sometimes wonder if God is not sending Hispanic Catholic immagrants into the United States to save the US Catholic Church from itself.

-Tim-

 

[Portrait]

Whoah!

The picture is not that bleak. As the Holy Father said just recently. While the picture in Europe is very dire and maybe in North America as well, the picture in South America, Africa and Asia is very good.

snip/

We have to be careful not to talk ourselves into despondency. That would not be very good. What we need to do filter out the problems in the northern hemisphere from the universal Church.

Dear Brother JR,

Cordial greetings and a very good day. Thankyou for your response.

In the Western world the Catholic Church is undeniably in a very melancholic condition and there is much doubt, instability and compromise with the godless world. Thus whilst what is happening in South America, Africa and Asia gives us some reasons to be cheerful, we cannot ignore the crisis within Western Catholicism or, God forbid, seek to deny that there even is a crisis. In any event, even the Third World countries are gradually beginning to tumble into Western license as they increasingly taste of decadent delights. We can only hope that they will be strong against the forces of materialism and godless intemprance.

Holy Mother Church was, dear friend, struck by the current crisis during the Sixties and Seventies, for in these crucial years, nation after nation discarded the yoke both of the Commandments and of Jesus Christ. Religious and priestly vocations plunged below survival levels and the shell-shocked faithful abandoned their parishes in favour of the most bizarre sects or simply to threw in their lot with the prevailing godless culture. Moroever, priests and religious abandoned their calling at a rate never seen hitherto. It is quite true that the mainline Protestant denominations have not escaped unscathed and here in the UK the Church of England has now completely lost its way and is in terminal decline. However, when the decadent culture of the Sixties emerged, the Catholic Church should have done a great deal more reproving and rebuking (cf. II Tim. 4: 2), thus nipping in the bud the rise of moral and cultural deterioration. Sadly, we have witnessed in the last 40 years the rise of an easy-going approach to the faith which is not unduly concerned about living up to the arduous requirements of our most holy religion. Moreover, many priests are seemingly unable or unwilling to reprimand or recall those who have gone astray or who are guitly of worldly conformity and compromise that causes the Christian religion to be evil spoken of. Even today people with no faith expect those who profess faith to behave and act differently and show that they have different dispostions and inclinations, as well as new sympathies and antipathies.

Certainly, dear friend, the flood of defections from religious life has abated and most rebellious bishops seem to have stepped back into line. Men may, however, talk loudly of renewed optimism and the Church being quite healthy enough to weather any storms, but, I wonder, is this a false optimism masking the present misery of the Church in the West? Sorry if this sounds rather negative and despondent but is it a good thing to comfort ourselves by being in denial respecting our true plight? Authentic indicators of the Church’s spiritual vitality remain jolly weak indeed. Mention religious renewal nowadays and men point you to the Charismatic movement, a mere copycat of errant Protestant Pentecostalism. This is but a straw fire fuelled by vapid sentimentalism and unhealthy emotionalism. Can we honestly say that it has ushered in genuine renewal and fostered an ardent desire for the pursuit of holiness? Again, is the Church of the West providing a vibrant Christian counter-culture where Catholics are acting as the moral disinfectant in a polluted culture? Methinks, that many are too busy adopting a hand in hand with the world type of religious profession to be any force for real good. Alas, they are, I fear, like saltless salt and are absolutely ineffective as examples of godliness to their pagan neighbours. If you bring to their notice texts such as keeping oneself “unspotted from the world” (Jam. 1: 27) and setting “your affection on things above, not on things on the earth” (Col. 3: 2), they will most probably accuse of being a joyless prigg and of wanting to take the Church in a Puritan direction!

The sad truth is, dear friend, that Mosques are being erected all over Europe, while the Catholic Church declines in faith and practice. No, we should not despair but we must, I think, freely acknowledge our Church’s monumental failure to condemn and admonish, through fear of being thought uncecessarily harsh and intransigent. This has been a mistake which has only resulted in a multitude of dissidents and an increase in worldly-minded Catholics, seeking ever to have one foot in the world and one foot in the Church.

It is my deepest conviction, dear friend, that the contemporary Catholicism, especially in the West, is being besieged by forces hostile to the Church and the cause of good. No doubt men will say by way of reply that that has always been the case and they are quite correct, but I do think that the present crisis is unprecedented and that we are living in very troublous times where a Laodicean lukewarmness is becoming all too common.

God bless.

Warmest good wishes,

Portrait

Pax

 

[Lormar]

Brother JR for Pope?

Think about it, folks. He’s holy. He knows his theology. I’m pretty sure he speaks many languages. And he’s already tech-savvy – he’d be the first Pope with a blog!

Long live Pope Francis!

:clapping::clapping::clapping:

 

[1AugustSon7]

Hmmm. If we’re just going to go with the usage of the word “sacrifice” I offer this from the Book of Common Prayers, 1549,

Comments?

Some more background, if you have time:

forwardinchrist.org/?p=270

“May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands…”
That’s the holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It cannot possibly be anything else. A Protestant would **at least **add and emphasize “spiritual” before saying “sacrifice”. As this is, a Protestant reformer would be terrified that the common peasants might imagine that the priest is re-presenting or making present on the altar the sacrifice of Christ at Calvary:

1366 The Eucharist is thus a sacrifice because it re-presents (makes present) the sacrifice of the cross, because it is its memorial and because it applies its fruit:

The quote you shared from the BCP quote shows all the evidence of the Protestant aversion to affirming that an actual sacrifice is taking place. It is loaded with qualifications that both dumb down and at places denies the Catholic understanding and substitutes a modified or insufficient understanding - a certain “this far and no further”.

 

[1AugustSon7]

It is my deepest conviction, dear friend, that the contemporary Catholicism, especially in the West, is being besieged by forces hostile to the Church and the cause of good. No doubt men will say by way of reply that that has always been the case and they are quite correct, but I do think that the present crisis is unprecedented and that we are living in very troublous times where a Laodicean lukewarmness is becoming all too common.

And no doubt the people claiming that this has always been the case would also be correct and have history on their side.

Personally, I think the Catholics of the late 18th century had perhaps better reason to be alarmed when they saw the eldest daughter of holy Mother Church sink into a fratricidal blood-bath, and even had to hear the news that the goddess Reason (or was it Liberty?) was being ceremonisouly worshipped in Notre Dame Cathedral, while the government was seriously considering enforcing a 10-day week and calendar in order to deny the 7-day week and rhythm of Creation.

You are correct in that perhaps we are in a relative state of lukewarmness in the N. Hemisphere; exactly so, however, we aren’t experiencing the corresponding irrational madness that borders on demoniacal hatred of Catholicism; however, as Catholicism is increasingly established in, e.g., N. America we are beginning to see that sort of frenzied hatred that hitherto was confined to Catholicism in Europe.

 

[ProVobis]

“May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands…”
That’s the holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It cannot possibly be anything else.

Okay but for 40 years the Catholic heard “Pray, brethren, that our sacrifice may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father.” And this was right after the Presentation of the Gifts and the “this bread to offer, which earth has given and human hands have made.” and “we have this wine to offer, fruit of the vine and work of human hands” Offertory. See the disassociation between “our” sacrifice and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass? Or didn’t any one else notice it?

Of course, they have now corrected it to “that my sacrifice and yours,” a step in the right direction at least.

By the way, I do agree with you on your “insufficient understanding” assessment.

 

[JReducation]

Br JR, I don’t think it’s nitpicking. Dom Gueranger in his Liturgical Institutions wrote in 1840:

Dom Gueranger lived in a different time when we still considered Protestants enemies of the Catholic Church. The Church does not see them as enemies. She would not make this statement today.

Today, she states that Latin is the official language of the Roman liturgy, but it is not the only language and she leaves it at that. She is not interested in getting rid of Latin or in enforcing it either. She’s interested in preserving it, even if it’s only uses occassionally. We have to think with the Holy See; otherwise, we run the risk of breaking with the primacy. That’s a dangerous place to be.

Dear Brother JR,

Cordial greetings and a very good day. Thankyou for your response.

In the Western world the Catholic Church is undeniably in a very melancholic condition and there is much doubt, instability and compromise with the godless world. Thus whilst what is happening in South America, Africa and Asia gives us some reasons to be cheerful, we cannot ignore the crisis within Western Catholicism or, God forbid, seek to deny that there even is a crisis. In any event, even the Third World countries are gradually beginning to tumble into Western license as they increasingly taste of decadent delights. We can only hope that they will be strong against the forces of materialism and godless intemprance.

Pax

I will again point you to the assessment of the universal Church made by the Holy See. While the Holy See acknowledges the critical state of Catholicism in the northern hemisphere, especially in Europe, it also acknowledges the incredible growth in Asia, Africa and South America.

The Holy See has not said that there is no problem. It has said that there is no universal problem as people want to make it. Pope Benedict spoke about this recently. It’s not the first time that he makes the same comment. He says, “Europe is not the Catholic Church.” We can’t evaluate the Catholic Church by Europe.

Having said this, we must also recognize that Europe is in desperate need of a new evangelization. This is what the Holy Father has called for. He is attempting to address the problem. Getting all upset with each other is not going to solve the problems of Europe and restore Catholicism there. On the contrary, it will drive the Europeans and Americans further away.

People in the developed nations are living a period of incredible stress and insecurity. The Church has to present itself to them as the safety zone. However, if they come into a forum as this and see how people speak to each other and how they speak to the Church, are they going to find safety here? Are they going to find unity here? Are they going to hear words of hope? Are they going to find Christ here?

At the end of the day, it’s about finding Christ. Catholics must be people of the Epiphany. We must be people through whom God reveals himself to the nations. How we live is more important than what we say.

 

[Timothysis]

Okay but for 40 years the Catholic heard “Pray, brethren, that our sacrifice may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father.” And this was right after the Presentation of the Gifts and the “this bread to offer, which earth has given and human hands have made.” and “we have this wine to offer, fruit of the vine and work of human hands” Offertory. See the disassociation between “our” sacrifice and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass? Or didn’t any one else notice it?

Of course, they have now corrected it to “that my sacrifice and yours,” a step in the right direction at least.

By the way, I do agree with you on your “insufficient understanding” assessment.

Are you insinuating that somehow the prior edition of the missal was deficient and presented an action that somehow wasn’t the Sacrifice of the Mass?

As stated before, the Mass is a distinctly Catholic action, a Sacrifice in accord to the commandment of Christ to “*do this in memory of me.” * The Church gave us a missal to do just that; therefore, it was valid and licit. What exactly are you insinuating? That by including “our” in the Offertory somehow made a non sacrifice?

 

[ProVobis]

Are you insinuating

I’m not insuating anything. It was documented.

“The Lord’s Supper is the assembly or gathering together of the people of God, with a priest presiding to celebrate the memorial of the Lord. For this reason the promise of Christ is particularly true of a local congregation of the Church: ‘Where two or three are gathered in my name there am I in their midst’” (General Instruction to the Novus Ordo, April 6, 1969).

Apparently the designation of the Mass in the first edition of the Novus Ordo as “the Lord’s Supper of the holy gathering or assembly of the people of God, as they come together, into one [body], with the priest as presider and taking on the persona of Christ, to celebrate the memorial of the Lord.” has its source in the Protestant theology of the Abendmahl rite, the commemorative meal.The fact that this particular definition of the Mass appears in a document bearing the signature of Pope Paul VI, and that it became necessary later to correct it, is a painful obvious indication of how confused things are in our Church today.

Footnotes:

Original text: Cena dominica sive Missa est sacra synaxis seu congregatio populi Dei in unum convenientis sacerdote praeside personamque Christi gerente, ad memoriale Domini celebrandum, Article 7, Editio typica, p. 15

Abendmahl: literally translated as “Evening Meal,” or “Supper”; generally referred to as “The Lord’s Supper.”

The revised text is: In missa seu Cena dominca populus Dei in unum convocatur, sacerdote praeside personamque Christi gerente, ad memoriale Domini seu sacrificium eucharisticum celebrandum (“In the Mass, or Supper of the Lord, the people of God are called together into one body, with the priest as presider and taking on the persona of Christ in order to celebrate the Memorial of the Lord, or the Eucharistic Sacrifice” (Article 7, Missale Romanum, Editio typica, Vatican, 1970), p. 29

The Reform of the Liturgy, Monsignor Gamber, 1993, Una Voce Press

 

[thunderboom]

As a former Traditionalist, I was taught that the Ordinary Form of the Mass which Pope Paul VI created in 1969 was written by him with the help of 6 Protestant ministers and that’s why the Mass is “Protestantized.” How can I respond to this ridiculous claim?

Hey, all I know is that when a validly-ordained Priest of Jesus Christ pronounces the words “This is my Body” and “This is my Blood” in context of the ritual prescribed by the Church of Jesus Christ, at that moment there is nothing else that truly matters in the entire universe.

 

[Timothysis]

I’m not insuating anything. It was documented.

So, I take it that you DO suggest that Mass became something other than a sacrifice?

What you are leaving out is the fact that many thought it unnecessary to explain in detail what the Mass is because, being Catholics, it was already thought to be understood. To try and suggest that Pope Paul’s missal changed the sacrifice of the Mass to simply a “gathering” is disingenuous. This is what the Church taught at the time of the Pauline Mass:

"Hence, the Mass, the Lord’s Supper, is at the same time and inseparably:

1. A sacrifice in which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated
2. a memorial of the death and resurrection of the Lord, who said “do this in memory of me” (Lk. 22:19).
3. a sacred banquet in which, through the communion of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the People of God share the benefits of the Paschal Sacrifice, renew the New Covenant which God has made with man once for all through the Blood of Christ. (Instruction on the Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery Eucharisticum Mysterium, #C1."

 

[Lormar]

The Church has to present itself to them as the safety zone. However, if they come into a forum as this and see how people speak to each other and how they speak to the Church, are they going to find safety here? Are they going to find unity here? Are they going to hear words of hope? Are they going to find Christ here?

It is all over and not just here. And it is not only the internet. There is not even unity in my parish. Forum rules forbid me from giving links to show what my parish did to a priest who simply wanted to follow the laws of the Church.

 

[Nesrad]

As a former Traditionalist, I was taught that the Ordinary Form of the Mass which Pope Paul VI created in 1969 was written by him with the help of 6 Protestant ministers and that’s why the Mass is “Protestantized.” How can I respond to this ridiculous claim?

The claim isn’t so ridiculous as it is malicious. Ecumenism (ie. converting Protestants) was probably an issue when the New Mass was devised. But the New Mass is a greater threat to Protestantism, in that it is likely to lead to the conversion of many of them, than to Traditional Catholicism of which it retains all the essential elements.

 

[QuestingKnight]

What you are leaving out is the fact that many thought it unnecessary to explain in detail what the Mass is because, being Catholics, it was already thought to be understood. To try and suggest that Pope Paul’s missal changed the sacrifice of the Mass to simply a “gathering” is disingenuous. This is what the Church taught at the time of the Pauline Mass:

"Hence, the Mass, the Lord’s Supper, is at the same time and inseparably:

1. A sacrifice in which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated
2. a memorial of the death and resurrection of the Lord, who said “do this in memory of me” (Lk. 22:19).
3. a sacred banquet in which, through the communion of the Body and Blood of the Lord, the People of God share the benefits of the Paschal Sacrifice, renew the New Covenant which God has made with man once for all through the Blood of Christ. (Instruction on the Worship of the Eucharistic Mystery Eucharisticum Mysterium, #C1."

My bold, above.

Mass isn’t primarily a lecture to students. It’s a mystical rite of thanksgiving, petitioning, adoration and propitiation of a god. Therefore the words should precisely express the intention directed towards the god worshipped.

If Roman Catholic priests have got the idea that mass is primarily a meal then it explains perfectly the occurence of what so annoys traditionalists: the banal communal modifications: Versus populum, lay lectors, CITH etc.

If it’s merely a meal and a happy one at that, then solemnity and exclusivity is not only inappropriate, it’s weird.

Someone should tell the folks in Ballymagash. They think they’re doing it right!

 

[ProVobis]

Today, she states that Latin is the official language of the Roman liturgy, but it is not the only language and she leaves it at that. She is not interested in getting rid of Latin or in enforcing it either. She’s interested in preserving it, even if it’s only uses occassionally. We have to think with the Holy See; otherwise, we run the risk of breaking with the primacy. That’s a dangerous place to be.

Br JR, the real danger I see is in interpreting/translating into one’s vernacular. The thinking after that is not all at the same level. For example, per the Vatican’s own English website, Mary is to be “worshipped.” A Pole or an Italian doesn’t “worship” Mary and he wouldn’t know what we’re talking about. Therefore it becomes a vernacular problem for the Anglophones and makes them most vulnerable to the English-speaking Protestants. But the Poles and Italians have vernacular issues of their own. The point is that theology should be expressed in some common terminology. Maybe the Church can make it the next 500 years without some commonness across cultures and continents but not without some major discord. Even Latin and Greek had language issues between them. When this is compounded over 500 times, wow is all I can say. Imagine the U.S. with 500 languages. Who would then say everyone should be able to hear everything in his own vernacular?

Dom Gueranger lived in a different time when we still considered Protestants enemies of the Catholic Church. The Church does not see them as enemies. She would not make this statement today.

The Protestants were/are not the only enemies of Rome. I think the point still stands.