Saturday, June 25, 2011

So Let Me Get This Straight...

In a recent interview, Ecclesia Dei's Msgr. Guido Pozzo explained that the reference in the Instruction 'Universae Ecclesiae' concerning Catholics who may be against the 'validity or legitimacy' of the Novus Ordo ("The faithful who ask for the celebration of the [Traditional Latin Mass] must not in any way support or belong to groups which show themselves to be against the validity or legitimacy of the Holy Mass or the Sacraments celebrated in the forma ordinaria [that is, the post-1960's form] or against the Roman Pontiff as Supreme Pastor of the Universal Church") actually refers to...
"certain groups of faithful who consider or propose an antithesis between the Missal of 1962 and that of Paul VI, and who believe that the rite promulgated by Paul VI for the celebration of the Sacrifice of the Holy Mass is detrimental to the faithful." (Msgr. Guido Pozzo)
So, let me get this straight... Cardinal Ottaviani, if he was still alive, would NOT be qualified to request the TLM?
Recall that the prophetic Cardinals Ottaviani & Bacci said the following concerning the Novus Ordo... (emphasis added)
"To abandon a liturgical tradition which for four centuries stood as a sign and pledge of unity in worship, and to replace it with another liturgy which, due to the countless liberties it implicitly authorizes, cannot but be a sign of division - a liturgy which teems with insinuations or manifest errors against the integrity of the Catholic Faith - is, we feel bound in conscience to proclaim, an incalculable error." (Cardinals Ottaviani & Bacci)

"We have limited ourselves above to a short study of the Novus Ordo where it deviates most seriously from the theology of the Catholic Mass. Our observations touch upon deviations which are typical. To prepare a complete study of all the pitfalls, dangers and psychologically and spiritually destructive elements the new rite contains, whether in texts, rubrics or instructions, would be a vast undertaking." (Cardinals Ottaviani & Bacci)
Yet, while the illustrious Cardinal Ottaviani would apparently NOT be qualified to request the TLM, the following 'Catholics' WOULD presumably be qualified to request the TLM (not that they ever would)...
Likewise, the following would presumably also be qualified...
What's wrong with this picture? And where does that leave Pope Benedict XVI? Recall that the Holy Father has said that...
"...in the place of liturgy as the fruit of development came fabricated liturgy. We abandoned the organic, living process of growth and development over the centuries, and replaced it - as in a manufacturing process - with a fabrication, a banal, on-the-spot product." (Cardinal Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI)
And, despite what the good Monsignor would like us to think, namely that...
"...it is clearly necessary to distinguish the rite and the Missal in themselves, celebrated according to the norms, and a certain understanding and application of the liturgical reform, characterized by ambiguity, doctrinal deformations, abuses and banalizations, events that are unfortunately so common that they led Cardinal J. Ratzinger to speak, without hesitations, in one of his publications of a 'collapse of the liturgy'"
...Pope Benedict could NOT have been speaking regarding results from a "certain understanding and application of the liturgical reform", because the Holy Father (when he was known as Cardinal Ratzinger) clearly stated, as indicated above, that we had "abandoned the organic, living process of growth and development over the centuries, and replaced it - as in a manufacturing process - with a fabrication, a banal, on-the-spot product." In his own words, he is referring to the "fabricated liturgy" itself, not to some distortion of it.
So given the above, who would be 'qualified' to request the TLM? Those in denial of or blind to the devastating fruits of the Novus Ordo? Those who do not know the TLM and who would therefore never request it? Those willing to say the emperor is fully clothed? Liberals & dissenters who are likely to be 'allergic' to the reverent traditional Mass?
Yet, good & knowledgeable Catholics who face facts are not 'qualified'? Besides the injustice of treating a certain group of good Catholics differently than others, it seems unconscionable to deny Catholics a spiritual good based on their discernment of the truths that are plainly before their eyes (e.g. that 70%+ of Catholics no longer believe in the Real Presence after 4 decades of the Novus Ordo). Even the 'chief architect' of the Novus Ordo admitted that he wanted to "strip from our Catholic prayers and from the Catholic liturgy everything which can be the shadow of a stumbling block" for heretics and he admitted that the liturgical reform he oversaw was a "major conquest of the Catholic Church".
That being said - by the 'chief architect' of the Novus Ordo himself - why can't good Catholics - armed with decades of hindsight - also believe this? And if they do, why does that fact disqualify them from requesting a form of Mass codified by Pope St. Pius V that was "grant[ed] and concede[d] in perpetuity that, for the chanting or reading of the Mass in any church whatsoever, this Missal is hereafter to be followed absolutely, without any scruple of conscience or fear of incurring any penalty, judgment, or censure, and may freely and lawfully be used" in a document that the Pope said "cannot be revoked or modified, but remain always valid and retain its full force"?
[6/25/11]