BOMBSHELL! NEW OFFICE MANAGER FOR THE CONGREGATION OF DIVINE WORSHIP ACKNOWLEDGES THE DECONSTRUCTION OF THE CLASSICAL ROMAN RITE AND WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE TO RECOVER WHAT HAS BEEN LOST THROUGH THE REFORM OF THE REFORM OF THE ORDINARY FORM OF THE LATIN RITE!

YES, VIRGINIA, THESE TWO PHOTOS ARE EXAMPLES OF THE TWO FORMS OF THE ONE ROMAN RITE, CAN YOU TELL THE DIFFERENCE? EXACTLY, VIRGINIA, YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO DETECT VERY LITTLE DIFFERENCE AND THIS IS PRECISELY WHAT VATICAN II ACTUALLY ENVISIONED FOR THE LITURGY IT SOUGHT TO MAKE MORE ACCESSIBLE TO THE CONGREGATION THROUGH A SIMPLE REFORM NOT A TOTAL REMAKE! THE LAST TWO PARAGRAPHS OF MY POST CONTAIN THE BOMBSHELL!!!

The Holy Father has named as Capo Ufficio [Head of the Office, or Office Manager] of the Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments Reverend Father Abbot Dom Michael John Zielinski, OSB Oliv.

He gave a lecture on the Classical Roman Rite in 2009 entitled The Culture and Heritage of the
Classical Roman Rite which you can read HERE.

Sometimes we miss the meaning of our English words although its meaning is right in front of our eyes. For me this is especially true of the word "culture." Abbot Dom Michael puts that word into its proper root meaning:

"Whilst in English the word “cult” has taken on a predominantly pejorative meaning, we must remember that “culture” finds its source in the Latin cultus, that
is, in the life of cult, of worship. Culture and cultus are inseparable.
It is above all in the worship of a people that their culture can be
found. Contemporary society knows this fact only too well. In the
cult of the film star, of the politician, and most clearly in that of the
sports team (with its attendant chant, vesture and ritual acts), we
see the sometimes questionable values and beliefs of secular society clearly enunciated, if not indeed worshiped. Secular culture relies on these acts of worship."

The following are more excerpts from his talk:

Similarly, though in a distinct manner, as Catholics, we too rely
on our cultus, our worship. Our dependence upon it is not only to
enunciate our belief in an educative or formative sense, but it is in
fact essential to our Christian life in order to join us sacramentally
with him whom we worship and to nourish the life of grace in the
soul. The life of the Christian is marked by worship, it is immersed in
the divine cultus. This is precisely the point made by Pope St Pius X
in his seminal Motu Proprio Tra le sollecitudini of 22 November 1903
when he spoke of the “active participation in the holy mysteries and
in the public and solemn prayer of the Church” being the “indispensable
fount” of “the true Christian spirit.”

MY COMMENT FIRST: THIS IS THE HEART OF HIS TALK AND SHOULD GIVE US ALL HOPE THAT THE HOLY SEE THROUGH THE CONGREGATION FOR DIVINE WORSHIP ACKNOWLEDGES THE CRISIS OF WORSHIP IN THE CHURCH TODAY AND KNOWS PRECISELY WHAT THAT CRISIS IS AND WHAT MUST BE DONE IN AN "ORGANIC WAY" TO RECOVER WHAT HAS BEEN LOST FOR US CATHOLICS:

Yet today, we are acutely conscious of the fact that all has not
been well in recent decades in respect of the cultural life of the Latin
rite of the Catholic Church. Western society has been suffering from
a profound cultural crisis for some time and this has impacted on
the Church. Indeed, our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI himself, as
Cardinal Ratzinger, expressed on a number of occasions his profound
concern for the crisis in the cultus of the Church that we have experienced
in the decades following the Second Vatican Council, from the
“fabrication” of new rites, to the banalization of ecclesiastical music
and the unprecedented re-ordering of the spatial arrangements of
churches (see The Ratzinger Report [Ignatius, 1985], The Feast of Faith
[Ignatius, 1986], The Spirit of the Liturgy [Ignatius, 2000]).

It is possible to say that, in recent decades, much of the cultural
heritage of the Church – from venerable rites to the many goods
employed in their service – has been endangered by an ideology of
novelty that has misunderstood if not rejected the profound respect
for the tradition that genuine creativity in continuity with tradition
had always understood. This of course, has not simply left us with
an impoverished cultural experience in our churches. Most crucially,
any impoverishment of the sacramentals themselves carries with it
the danger of weakening the very encounter with the incarnate Lord
which these rites and ritual things facilitate. We creatures of flesh
and blood ordinarily require these cultural goods in order to enter
into the life of grace and to persevere in it until the end. They serve
to raise our minds and hearts to Almighty God, and to lead us into
that encounter from which we receive grace. Devaluing or dismissing them may have – indeed has had – an adverse effect on the life of
faith of many in recent times.

MY COMMENT FIRST: Haven't I been writing this all along?:

The modern liturgy should stand in that same tradition and should
be celebrated accordingly. But we know only too well, that in recent
decades the modern liturgy has often not been offered as something
in continuity with tradition, but as something radically new, different
from “what we did before Vatican II,” as the saying goes. And this
explains why today young people who have never known the older
rites, and priests who have never celebrated them, discover something
radically new and fresh in the older form of the Roman Rite. Where
they have persevered in tilling the arid ground of rupture, they come
to rejoice in the fertile soil of continuity.

This is why it is not only good that the classical liturgy may freely
be celebrated, but that it is important that it should be celebrated
widely. As the former Prefect of the Pontifi cal Commission “Ecclesia
Dei,” Darío Cardinal Castrillón Hoyos, himself said, “the Holy Father
wants the ancient use of the Mass to become a normal occurrence in
the liturgical life of the Church so that all of Christ’s faithful – young
and old – can become familiar with the older rites and draw from
their tangible beauty and transcendence” (Address to the Latin Mass
Society of England and Wales, 14 June 2008). For these rites, as well
as themselves drawing people closer to Christ, also act as a prophetic
witness to Catholic culture in a way that, to use Holy Father’s words,
can be “mutually enriching” for the modern rites.

MY COMMENT FIRST: The following is the bombshell that will guide the reform of the reform of the Ordinary Form of the Mass which is in process now but a bit too slow for some, like me:

The Holy Father teaches by his personal example. As
the celebrant of the liturgy it is clear that – in spite of the personal
attention that people afford him due to his office – he strives to be
the servant of the liturgy and not its proprietor. And in a simple yet
undoubtedly crucial restoration – that of distributing Holy Communion
to communicants kneeling at papal Masses – Pope Benedict has said once and for that all traditional ritual gestures and postures retain their value.

The same principle can be applied to the Church’s treasury of
sacred music and indeed of sacred architecture. This rich heritage
which has lifted up countless hearts and minds to the contemplation
of Almighty God over centuries has validity today, and whilst it is
certainly living and capable of development through authentic enrichment,
it is by no means to be jettisoned because it originated before
a particular date. One only needs to recall the explicit but widely
ignored call of the Second Vatican Council for Gregorian chant to “be
given pride of place in liturgical services” to understand how much
work needs to be done in reconnecting much modern practice with
the Church’s heritage (see the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy
Sacrosanctum concilium [4 December 1963] §116).