I know that the Council of Trent was a bulwark against the Protestant Reformation and led to a truly new springtime for the Church, especially in the post-World War II period prior to Vatican II.
Vatican I caused some controversy and led to a schism by the Old Catholics.
Vatican II has created many schisms, especially with those who have sought the ordination of women, who want to redefine the sexual morality of the Church, allowing for LGBTQ++++ ideologies and redefining genders, Holy Orders and Matrimony.
It appears that the FSSPX bishops will be excommunicated and possibly all those who attend their chapels. If so, it makes clear that Todos, Todos, Todos, only applies to sexual sinners who flaunt their sin in the most public way and even at Mass. But if you go to an FSSPX parish or chapel, that will get you excommunicated.
At any rate, after more than 60 years after Vatican II there is still division and chaos over just about everything.
Most sane Catholics know that this is not renewal and it certainly has not brought about a new springtime for the Church. But that’s the Church today.
22 comments:
Your essay is "on-point" and describes the problem well, I think. Our situation reminds me of the story of the baseball manager who, in exasperation, says to his team, "Doesn't anybody here know how to play this game?" What truly astonishes me is that we still get converts despite the chaos.
The liberals at Vatican II did indeed manage to insert some things which amounted to the nose of the camel in the Arab's tent, enough ambiguity to allow liberals to run with the ball while saying, "Ball? What ball?", and which has continued to this day.
The problem being that those with good intentions and wanting to make the Church a place for everybody have succeeded only in making it a nobody. This happened because if everything was wrong and outdated in the past, then why should anyone believe it today?
Trent caused its own sorts of chaos. Jansenism grew out of the reforming impulse of Trent (Jansenius might be thought of as a proponent of "the spirit of Trent"). Likewise Nicaea caused a lot of chaos that didn't get cleared up until Constantinople over fifty years later. And Ephesus and Chalcedon resulted in significant schisms in the Church. So if you don't like chaos, my suggestion would be to avoid having councils.
Should that be the manner in which Pope Leo XIV applies "Todos, Todos, Todos," — that is, excommunications extended even to laymen who attend SSPX chapels — then so it.
As His Holiness said it regard to the SSPX plan to consecrate bishops without Papal mandate, ""If they make that choice, I am sorry, but we must move forward."
Key words: "If they make that choice..."
Should the SSPX proceed with the consecrations in question, then that is the Society's choice. Should His Holiness apply penalties to laymen attached to SSPX chapels, then that is on laymen who remained attached to the Society.
Pope Leo XIV has not, nor will he, exclude anybody from the Church's practice of Todos, Todos, Todos. Folks who embrace the grave sin of schism have excluded themselves.
Therefore, it falls to the SSPX, as well as laymen attached to Society chapels, to embrace Pope Leo XIV in full communion.
Todos, Todos, Todos is easy to accomplish...maintain simply full communion with Holy Mother Church.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
The approach of the Consecration of Bishops for SSPX could ask us to rehearse the reasons behind these consecrations - namely, that it is for the survival of SSPX and the salvation of souls. No- one appears to have addressed these affirmations. Does SSPX need to survive and would these ‘souls’ be saved by other means?
Father Joseph Ratzinger viewed the Council of Trent as having been an overall "inadequate" response to Martin Luther's attack upon the Church.
Father Ratzinger credited Trent with having eliminated "the worst
abuses and make possible a certain measure of rebirth."
However, he argued that at the time of Vatican II, the Roman Liturgy, and in turn, the spiritual state of the Latin Church, had experienced centuries-long destruction that he had linked to the Council of Trent.
Father Joseph Ratzinger:
"The Catholic reaction to Luther's attack took place at Trent. The reaction was on the whole inadequate, even if it did eliminate the worst abuses and make possible a certain measure of rebirth. Trent was content to do two things:
"(a) To set forth integral Catholic doctrine, now (at least in regard to the idea of sacrifice) presented in purer form.
"But Trent did not sufficiently consider the Reformation's genuine problems of
conscience, nor did it realize how problematic were the notions of adoration and sacrifice-the two main difficulties of late medieval eucharistic doctrine.
"(b) The overgrowth of liturgical non-essentials was cut back and strict measures taken to prevent a recurrence of this.
"The main measure was to centralize all liturgical authority in the Sacred
Congregation of Rites, the post-conciliar organ for implementation of the
liturgical ideas of Trent.
"This measure, however, proved to be two-edged. New overgrowths were in fact prevented, but the fate of liturgy in the West was now in the hands of a strictly centralized and purely bureaucratic authority.
"This authority completely lacked historical perspective; it viewed the liturgy solely in terms of ceremonial rubrics, treating it as a kind of problem of proper court etiquette for sacred matters.
"This resulted in the complete archaizing of the liturgy, which now passed from the stage of living history, became embalmed in the status quo and was ultimately doomed to internal decay.
"The liturgy had become a rigid, fixed and firmly encrusted system; the more out of touch with genuine piety, the more attention was paid to its prescribed forms.
"We can see this if we remember that none of the saints of the Catholic Reformation drew their spirituality from the liturgy.
"Ignatius of Loyola, Theresa of Avila and John of the Cross developed their religious life solely from personal encounter with God and from individual experience of the Church, quite apart from the liturgy and any deep involvement with it.
"The baroque era adjusted to this situation by superimposing a kind of para-liturgy on the archaized actual liturgy...the Mass was frequently covered over with devotions more attractive to the popular mentality.
"Even Leo XIII recommended that the rosary be recited during Mass in the month of October. In practice this meant that while the priest was busy with his archaic liturgy, the people were busy with their devotions to
Mary.
"They were united with the priest only by being in the same church with him..."
Pax.
Mark Thomas
"Does SSPX need to survive and would these ‘souls’ be saved by other means?"
Part the First: "Does SSPX need to survive?" No. Its existence isn't required. Some may WANT it to survive, but that's a want, not a need.
Part the Second: "Would these ‘souls’ be saved by other means?" If one believes, "Extra Fraternitas Sacerdotalis Sancti Pii X Nulla Salus," then yes. However, that belief is heretical. So the answer is "Yes, there are other means."
MT avoids the failure of V II like the plague. It must be nice to live in a fantasy world
Father McDonald said..."It appears that the FSSPX bishops will be excommunicated and possibly all those who attend their chapels. If so, it makes clear that Todos, Todos, Todos, only applies to sexual sinners who flaunt their sin in the most public way and even at Mass. But if you go to an FSSPX parish or chapel, that will get you excommunicated."
Pope Leo XIV declared in regard to the SSPX:
"We have invited them...Do not do this. Let us try to live communion in the Church. But it is their choice. But they refuse to accept certain fundamental elements of the Church, beginning with various points of the Second Vatican Council. And if they make those choices, I am sorry. But we must move forward.”
The question is why is the Society determined (should they disobey Pope Leo VIX) to travel the path that leads to schism?
The Apostolic See informed the SSPX that the "episcopal ordinations announced by the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X do not have the corresponding pontifical mandate. This action will constitute ‘a schismatic act’, and ‘formal adherence to the schism constitutes a grave offense against God and entails the excommunication established by the law of the Church’."
Pope Leo XIV has offered "Todos, Todos, Todos" to the SSPX.
But it is unfortunate that the SSPX, to Satan's delight, is willing to reject "Todos, Todos, Todos."
Pax.
Mark Thomas
Satan is a lot happier with the German bishops and Pope Francis for not disciplining the clerics at the Vatican engaged in a cocaine fueled gay sex orgy. MT NEVER acknowledges that. Is that Satanic on his part?
Father McDonald said..."Most sane Catholics know that this is not renewal and it certainly has not brought about a new springtime for the Church. But that’s the Church today."
That is the SSPX's position in regard to the Church and Council. The SSPX believes that Pope Leo XIV is another Pope Francis, Pope Benedict XVI...another Vatican II Era Pope who will continue to run the Church into the ground.
The Society believes that God has called the SSPX to deliver the Pope from his supposed embrace of Modernism.
Speaking humanly, that degree of fanaticism has rendered it all but impossible for Pope Leo XIV to persuade the Society to embrace full communion with Holy Mother Church.
A miracle is required to compel the SSPX to deliver their fraternity from its July 1 rendezvous with schism/Satan. Nevertheless, I pray for said miracle.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
“Invited” in this case must be bishop-speak for “obey or be excommunicated,” which was the “invitation” Cardinal “Kiss me, witch” issued in his first meeting with the SSPX. What a warm invitation!
Nick
I would agree in the first: SSPX does not need to survive. It is not of Dominical institution. But, is hopefulness sufficient for those souls ? Perhaps, it is.
While I do not support the SSPX consecrating bishops without papal approval, we should not address this in isolation. It is well past time to address the injustices by both Rome and the local bishops that let to the creation of the SSPX in the first place.
Father Anthony,
The irony of it all is that if the shoe was on the other foot, these so-called “tolerant and welcoming” liberals would be squealing like stuck pigs’
Yes! Sure, rules are rules and justice is justice, but rules or justice applied unequally are no rules or justice at all, and only chaos and corruption, and chaos and corruption is what we have today.
If the SSPX is excommunicated in whole or part for performing consecrations which the Vatican could easily approve at no cost to them, while all the rest of this chaos and corruption allowed to run unchecked, we do NOT have a just action by the Vatican, but instead, a grave injustice.
Bob I think you are mixing apples and oranges. If the pope were to give permission for the ordinations or worse, ignore them and allow them to proceed without comment or excommunication, that would open up Pandora’s Box for bishops to be ordained without papal or Vatican approval. At least Pope Leo is exercising proper canonical common sense here even if he or other popes don’t in other serious issues. However, any bishop, deacon or priest who assists with the “ordination” of a woman claiming to be Catholic and ordained a Catholic priest, I believe those clerics are automatically excommunicated and in the case of recent priests who have attended and participated in these ordinations, I believe they are suspended by the pope from the priesthood.
No apples and oranges at all. What harm would it cause the Church to ordain those who do not hold with conclusions of what was a PASTORAL council and not a dogmatic council, no new binding dogma was put forth, no change to the Credo, so why the forbidding of ordinations by an order who believes ALL which came before this pastoral/only council? It not as if they are betraying the Faith, quite the opposite. Equating it with ordination of women is as false an equivalency as Weigel's Feeney comparison.
What this entire issue mainly boils down to is the Vatican refusing to admit anything wrong, and doing anything it can to prevent it from needing to admit mistakes....mainly about preserving reputation, and authority....admit anything, anything at all, out of Vatican II might be better formulated or even dropped? NEVER! Admit a Pope was rash and ill advised to wholesale redo the ancient Mass rather than the intended use of vernacular in the ancient Mass? HEAVEN FORBID! And for anyone who says different? SUPPRESS them! EXCOMMUNICATE them for daring to question or refuse follow orders...after all, can't admit mistakes, what would the optics look like?
Bob, you nailed it! Talk about clericalism on steroids!
Notice how MT can never refute a comment? He just spews some more non sequiturs
Bob,
To bounce off of your points, I fail to imagine what else the Vatican would do if they did just want to cast the SSPX out into the outer darkness, once and for all, as consequence for their greatest transgression. And their greatest sin is not hesitating to adhere to the non-dogmas of a pastoral counsel, but rather putting the Vatican in the position of either getting rid of them or losing face over (or even worse, backtracking one jot from) the muddled language or faulty implementations of the uber-Council. Of course the Vatican was always going to choose the former.
Nick
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