It’s a question relevant to the thread. If you believe that the new Missal is a reflection of the abuses that happened after Vatican II, it would require you to explain why you think the Vatican approved it with those abuses in place.The Missal is what it is, and the priest will be who he is. I don’t know how to answer that question, which seems to be quite loaded btw.
For the record, I’ve never walked out of a guitar Mass. LIturgical dancing never bothered me either. I just figured it’s all part of the design for certain cultures, am I wrong?
DId I call them abuses? Problems with not being able to pray maybe, but I’ll leave the charges of abuses to others who know more about the liturgy than I do.It’s a question relevant to the thread. If you believe that the new Missal is a reflection of the abuses that happened after Vatican II, it would require you to explain why you think the Vatican approved it with those abuses in place.
Of course the changes occurred on the local level; but I am referring to origins, not to change itself. In what you call ‘‘the gist,’’ there is a suspicious absence: the bishops at the council itself. The Church does not operate like Rousseau’s hyperbolic state, where the Lawgiver writes the law and then goes away so that the Sovereign can take over; in fact, Rousseau made it that way precisely so that the law and its implementation would be kept separate. In the Church, both in the present day as in the time immediately after Vatican II, the Lawgiver is the Sovereign: the implementers are the ones who wrote the law.Oh please. The changes occurred at the local level. And as I have posted twice, Pope Benedict, shortly before stepping down as Pope, addressed the Vatican II abuses and put the blame on the media…
I quite agree; one of those fronts was the council fathers themselves. Basically, I am saying that there really is something to the ‘‘Spirit of Vatican II’’ argument. The bishops needed, mostly for the sake of custom, virtually unanimous agreement (to read on this, I’d again recommend Norman Tanner - his book ‘‘The Councils of the Church’’ is a good synopsis) on the wording of the documents, but when they got back to their respective dioceses, the majority were free to implement their true program. Lefebvre himself pointed out that his was the only seminary in the world that was actually abiding by the practical dictates of Optatam Totius.Once the enemy got the Vatican II signal, the attack was on, on many fronts.
Interesting scenario, but that’s not how it worked. Some local Churches did what the media did - slow, gradual changes. I was there. We didn’t go from singing Let it Be by the Beatles in the 1970s to Clown Masses overnight. The poison did not go very far in some places, in others, it did.Of course the changes occurred on the local level; but I am referring to origins, not to change itself. In what you call ‘‘the gist,’’ there is a suspicious absence: the bishops at the council itself. The Church does not operate like Rousseau’s hyperbolic state, where the Lawgiver writes the law and then goes away so that the Sovereign can take over; in fact, Rousseau made it that way precisely so that the law and its implementation would be kept separate. In the Church, both in the present day as in the time immediately after Vatican II, the Lawgiver is the Sovereign: the implementers are the ones who wrote the law.
It strains credulity beyond the breaking point to hold that these same bishops, having just blown on the ink to dry upon the documents, returned to their respective dioceses to find a massive, inter-continental conspiracy that shares a largely uniform ideology in virtually every diocese and order in the world. The problem with throwing the blame entirely upon the media is that it invalidly bifurcates the council fathers, making them feudal lords trapped in their own towers, while pretenders prance about deliriously. 'Tis a tad too convenient a romantic idea.
It is true, of course, that public reception was influenced by the media. The Jesuit Father, Professor Norman Tanner, has written some very interesting articles on the anglophone media’s influence on the english-speaking world’s popular reception of Vatican II. To blame all the abuses on the media, though, ignores the influence of the bishops themselves.
I quite agree; one of those fronts was the council fathers themselves. Basically, I am saying that there really is something to the ‘‘Spirit of Vatican II’’ argument. The bishops needed, mostly for the sake of custom, virtually unanimous agreement (to read on this, I’d again recommend Norman Tanner - his book ‘‘The Councils of the Church’’ is a good synopsis) on the wording of the documents, but when they got back to their respective dioceses, the majority were free to implement their true program. Lefebvre himself pointed out that his was the only seminary in the world that was actually abiding by the practical dictates of Optatam Totius.
That would fit the situation as it in fact happened: bishops at least complacent in a worldwide implementation of a program that directly contradicts in many respects the documents that they themselves wrote. Orthodoxy is not just a matter of words on paper, even if that paper is bound in a nice big volume that says ‘‘Vatican II’’ on the cover.
I believe these changes were immediate: Dropping the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar and the Last Gospel, replaced by the 4-hymn sandwich. The communion formula was shortened to “Corpus Christi” and forced a response “Amen” from the communicant. This all happened around 1965. Standing for communion happened shortly after and the Mass became audibilized. I don’t think the parishes took their marching orders from the media.Interesting scenario, but that’s not how it worked. Some local Churches did what the media did - slow, gradual changes. I was there. We didn’t go from singing Let it Be by the Beatles in the 1970s to Clown Masses overnight. The poison did not go very far in some places, in others, it did.
“Reason is by study, labor, and exercise of logic, philosophy, and other liberal arts corroborate * and quickened; and the judgment both in them and also in orators, laws, and stories [is] much ripened. And although poets are with many men taken but for painted words, yet do they much help the judgment, and make a man among other things well furnished in one special thing, without which all learning is half lame…a good mother wit.”I would also like at this point to state to Edwest2 and LongingSoul that I do not wish for my arguments to seem dismissive; I do not like this rather artificial way of arguing since it makes everything stilted.
Merry and Blessed Christmas to you both.
I have already posted it but you may find it interesting, I didThe ecclesiology of the Church was altered.
This reply is rather disappointing, particularly since you’ve said nothing new. You still have to explain the curiosity that the Council Fathers, on returning to their dioceses and monasteries, implemented the documents of Vatican II in a way contrary to the documents themselves. Your particular media conspiracy is simply too complicated: to be true, the Council Fathers must really have been opposed to these dissidents’ hijacking of their ideas but, in practically every place in the world, found opposition so formidable that they locked themselves in towers and refused even to raise their voices against it - and when one did, he was ostracized from the French hierarchy.Interesting scenario, but that’s not how it worked. Some local Churches did what the media did - slow, gradual changes. I was there. We didn’t go from singing Let it Be by the Beatles in the 1970s to Clown Masses overnight. The poison did not go very far in some places, in others, it did.
It only takes a handful of dissidents inside the Church and a mass media to cause confusion and amplify the wrong messages to get the desired results.
I would be happy to review those audiences; of course, Pope Benedict was also a theorist of the absolute continuity of pre and post Vatican II teaching, which I hold in some doubt. It is still good to get it from him.So, yes, to say it one more time, Pope Benedict left Vatican II for his last days as Pope and told us what happened.
Yes, there were dissidents in the Church who did their best to wreck it.There are a number of reasons for this… I think it boils down to a couple of things.
First, some may find that a lot of teachings of Vatican II come across as having a moderny, seculary feel to them and seem to fly in the face of what has traditionally been taught by the Catholic Church, and the attitudes that have been held by both clergy and faithful for a very long time. An example of this is from Lumen Gentium, where it is explained that some who are visibly outside of the Catholic Church can still be saved. This seems very much to contradict Jesus’ own teachings, who said that “noone can come to the father except by me.” It also seems to contradict a lot of papal bulls from medieval times, such as Pope Boniface’s Unam Sanctam, which states “We declare, say, define, and pronounce that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff.” Lumen Gentium explains that the words of our Lord and of the popes regarding no salvation outside the Church are not applied to certain people groups, i.e. people who “through no fault of their own” have never come to truly know the gospel. To many this may seem like an intellectual backflip, a sort of “cop out” that excuses people from genuinely pursuing repentance. Some would think that the attitudes expressed in Lumen Gentium are inconsistent with the scriptures as well as the continuous teaching of the Catholic Church for the past 2000 years.
I think the second reason why some people reject it is because they take a “by their fruits you will know them” approach to it. Since the introduction of Vatican II, liberalism in the Catholic Church has run rampant. Liturgical abuse is rampant. Catechesis is horrible. So on and so forth. And all of this is done “in the spirit of Vatican II.” Some would view that a lot of the Catholic Church in the world, especially in America, has in many ways been stripped of its heritage as well as, seemingly, its teaching authority. Many would feel that bishops do very little to lead the flock or discipline them in any way anymore. Even many who accept Vatican II feel this way. But there are those who are tempted to look at Vatican II and all that has come after it, and reject it outright as being heretical in nature.
'This loyal submission of the will and intellect must be given in a special way to the authentic teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff, even when he does not speak ex cathedra, in such wise, indeed, that his supreme teaching authority be acknowledged with respect, and that one sincerely adhere to the decisions made by him, conformably with his manifest mind and intention, which is made known principally either by the character of the documents in question, or by the frequency with which. a certain doctrine is proposed, or by the manner in which the doctrine is formulated.25'Any particular point you wish to make using these books?
The only counter I have to these arguments is that unlike Trent which stood behind its documents with anathemas, the documents didn’t list any penalties for not abiding with its directives. They more or less leave it to Canon Law to do that.From the book: “Ralph M. McInerny. What went wrong with VATICAN II.
(Sophia Institute Press, 1998, paperback, 168 pgs)”
I especially liked the penalty of boiling dissenters to death in oil like Pomponio Algerio during the period of that Council. He lived for 15 minutes and then learned his lesson in the afterlife presumably.The only counter I have to these arguments is that unlike Trent which stood behind its documents with anathemas, the documents didn’t list any penalties for not abiding with its directives. They more or less leave it to Canon Law to do that.
The Church has always taught that salvation may be achieved as a non-Catholic. From the 1941 Baltimore Catechism:In the final analysis, the catholic dogma that there is no salvation outside the church was considered antiquated as salvation could be acheived as a non-catholic.
- What do we mean when we say, “Outside the Church there is no salvation?”
When we say, “Outside the Church there is no salvation,” we mean that Christ made the Catholic Church a necessary means of salvation and commanded all to enter it, so that a person must be connected with the Church in some way to be saved.
(My bold). After Vatican II the Church has perhaps been more explicit in describing how this could happen, but the doctrine really hasn’t been changed. It’s logically consistent to assume that if the Church recognizes that a Protestant Trinitarian baptism is sacramentally valid, then Protestants so baptized are connected in some way to the Catholic Church. The argument that somehow Vatican II swung wide open the gates of heaven to non-Catholics simply does not hold sway. The Church has never appropriated for herself what is God’s sole authority to give, she simply shows us th most assured path to salvation. Nor does she guarantee that full membership in the Catholic Church assures salvation. It is possible for a Protestant to be saved and a Catholic to be damned.
- How can persons who are not members of the Catholic Church be saved?
Persons who are not members of the Catholic Church can be saved if, through no fault of their own, they do not know that the Catholic Church is the true Church, but they love God and try to do His will, for in this way they are connected with the Church by desire.
Well, when you stress an ecumenical theme and spirit, it seems counter intuitive that you would want to stress papal submission at the same time. Protestants, our brothers, as I understand things can be saved without even knowing who the Pope is. Was that way even before Vatican II, as OraLabora correctly points out.I especially liked the penalty of boiling dissenters to death in oil like Pomponio Algerio during the period of that Council. He lived for 15 minutes and then learned his lesson in the afterlife presumably.
The common denominator between the Church and a Protestant there was identified significantly by convert John Henry Newman when he called our conscience the ‘aboriginal vicar of Christ’. Submission to the Church should have the same character as submission to ones own conscience. A Catholic should recognise that relationship between conscience and Church. A Protestant doesn’t recognise that relationship but can still identify the same Voice which speaks through the Church… speaking through his conscience.Well, when you stress an ecumenical theme and spirit, it seems counter intuitive that you would want to stress papal submission at the same time. Protestants, our brothers, as I understand things can be saved without even knowing who the Pope is. Was that way even before Vatican II, as OraLabora correctly points out.