Arguments for the NO Mass?
  • Ha! Stimson -
    Sarum might, indeed, have been a worthy goal. I would have been all for it. But, realistically, it would never have been accepted. As it is we have a marriage of Sarum and various BCPs. This, after all, seems exemplary of the varieties of elements and strains which make up the 'Anglican Patrimony'. Indeed, we are very, VERY, fortunate that we have what we have. Had it been left up to our English cousins, the 'Anglican Use' might well have been the NO with 'the Prayer of Humble Access' and a couple of other tid-bits tacked onto it. (The Prayer of Humble Access, by the way, was part of the Sarum prayers of preparation in the sacristy. Cranmer's superb translation and its inclusion into the BCP liturgy was surely inspired. It used to be said quietly only by the priest, the people responding 'amen', but in recent prayer books it is commonly recited by all.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • francis
    Posts: 10,848
    No liturgy was ever made in a vacuum.
    with one exception!

    The liturgical reform, in its concrete realization, has distanced itself even more from its origin. The result has not been a reanimation, but devastation. In place of the liturgy, fruit of a continual development, they have placed a fabricated liturgy. They have deserted a vital process of growth and becoming in order to substitute a fabrication. They did not want to continue the development, the organic maturing of something living through the centuries, and they replaced it, in the manner of technical production, by a fabrication, a banal product of the moment. (Ratzinger in Revue Theologisches, Vol. 20, Feb. 1990, pgs. 103-104)
  • Jackson's lucid comments here about liturgical praxis are precisely why Pope Benedict established the Anglican Ordinariate in the first place. An accurate translation would have been a good idea -- and should have been a minimum requirement once the vernacular camel had got its nose into the tent -- but clearly merely accurate won't do. It should be beautiful, too. Hence, "O thou, the central orb of righteousness" is preferable to [quoting Jeffrey Morse] "Hey you, middle ball".

    Groups of Anglicans wanted to come home, but looked askance (if that's a fair assessment) at the mess they were being invited to adopt. Thanks be to God, Pope Benedict noticed Anglicanorum Coetibus. Those former Anglicans came home.

    Speaking as a former Episcopalian myself, the sheer banal, ugly vesture in which the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is draped in the Ordo of Paul VI nearly kept me out... but once in, it sent me looking for the traditional forms.

    The more I continue to have access to the Venerable Form, the more I am struck by how my faith has grown, and my appreciation for the depth of Catholic thought and praxis has deepened.
  • melofluentmelofluent
    Posts: 4,160
    Indeed. I had to re-read his post after reading your explanation to see that you are, in fact, correct.

    I suppose that's some solace. I'm sorry to have fatigued folks. That said, I was only trying to provide some musique-concrete for discussion, and I don't think my concern was all that obtuse. There are some serious irresistible/immovable dynamics in the IGRM for the NO which I believe could be remedied.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,367
    To Stimson’s point: it’s hard to argue for the TLM without reference to anything brought in since in the 1960s. Perhaps that is just it. We do what was clearly handed on to us, and there’s no need to argue.
    Thanked by 1eft94530
  • StimsonInRehabStimsonInRehab
    Posts: 1,934
    You reminded me, Matt, of one comment I heard from a brother in a traditionalist order about his devotion to the TLM: "We're just taking care of it until such time that the Church as a whole decides to take it up wholeheartedly again."
    Thanked by 2tomjaw eft94530
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,367
    I agree wholeheartedly.
    Thanked by 1tomjaw
  • Stimson,

    I must take issue with your assessment that people are hard-pressed to make a case for the TLM without comparison to the NO. Recognizing that my parallel has an element of the shocking, the reason it's so difficult to speak lovingly and not comparatively about the TLM is precisely the same reason it is sometimes difficult to talk about the beauty of marriage without some reference to contraception: in the modern world, it's everywhere. Imagine (since my confreres here are all music-interested) explaining the beauty of Palestrina without, even in passing mentioning the ugliness Cardinal Arinze describes as "organized noise". Sure, it can be done, robustly even, but a comparison is being made by those who hear (or read) even if the speaker/writer doesn't make such comparisons.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • More about Anglican-influenced praxis - as opposed to the wholesale 'Anglicanisation' which neither I nor Liam and others who remarked above want.

    Recently, the vicar general of the Ordinariate related that he and others of our priests (Fr Hough being one) often say masses at a variety of OF churches and schools. Fr Perkins noted that one very common reaction from people at these OF places is something on the order of - 'its so different the way you celebrate mass', 'how do you do it', 'when you say our mass it seems so sacred', etc, etc. One can imagine quite a variety of things that might be said that reflect similar reactions to our old OF in the hands of Ordinariate and erstwhile Anglican priests. There is amongst many Catholics a thirst for just such holiness, a thirst of which few priests are aware or are spiritually equipped to slake. There is an innate sense of the holy, an inborn intuition of sacredness which is not witnessed in all but a relative few of our Roman brethren. So, no! Absolutely not! Anglicanisation is not nor should be the answer. But, following the council an attempt to capture the sense of the Numinous, the Totally Other, that seems to be characteristic of the EF and the OU, should have, could have, sanely ought to have been cultivated for the NO. It might so easily have been done had more mature minds been at the helm - had the bishops come home and enacted what they actually wrote at Rome. But, no! The immature minds which seized the day pawned off on us the happy-clappy mass, the mass peppered with announcements and commentary, all designed for a people, a laity, who were, apparently, thought to be idiots.

    The NO, as I've said many times herein before, would be a very different thing in the hands of Anglicans. It doesn't have to be Tudor English, it doesn't have to be Anglican chant and Anglican anthems and hymns. It just has to be the best of the Roman tradition intelligently adapted to the NO, an NO informed by historic Catholic ritual affect and absent the announcers and chatty priests who are, apparently, embarrassed to death of the sanctity of the mass and think their people are stupid, so have to cutefy it and make it 'palatable'.

    If we were to celebrate a mass at Walsingham according to the Novus Ordo (which, I'm pretty sure, will never happen) it would be totally different in aesthesis and sanctity than it is in the average Catholic parish. And, I dare say it would, likewise, be a very different thing if it were celebrated by an EF priest. How many different ways does one have to repeat it - it isn't the rite! It's what pitifully formed priests, and pitifully catechised and dumbed-down laity make it out to be.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • And, a word about Chris' observation just above -

    He does hit upon a certain truth. I observed long ago that we homo sapiens commonly, very commonly, understand 'things' by drawing conclusions from opposites. Beauty may at times need to be contrasted with ugliness so that its ineffable splendour may more readily be apprehended. Virtue may at times achieve a greater appreciation when contrasted with vice. And so on and on. Chris may wax fervently all day about the excruciatingly sublime beauty of Palestrina or Tallis, but, he may find, at times, that nothing will 'drive his point home' like a contrasting example of unutterably trashy music. Contrast will often make clearer than ever the unspeakable difference betwixt the beautiful and the hideous, the meritorious and the meretricious.

    On the other hand, one must be careful that it is true opposites that are being contrasted. Here, I think, is where some of our discussion in this fascinating thread becomes relevant. Is it logically accurate, intellectually honest, to think of the EF and the OF as opposites, as positives and negatives which cancel each other out? I don't think so. Nor do I think it appropriate to castigate one or the other, or point out the shortcomings of one as if that cancelled out the shortcomings of the other. We are not dealing here with da Vinci versus Kinkaid or Warhol, but with da Vinci versus Picasso or Turner. These are not opposites. They are kindred in the quality of their application of the painterly arts, or of ritual and sacred language. The EF is theologically prolix, the OF terse. There are currently faults (and by 'faults' I here mean failures to exhibit in their respective current praxes faithfulness to Vatican II's precepts) to be addressed in the praxis of each. Celebrated ideally according Vatican II's precepts they would each be a thing of equal beauty, kindred rites - not opposites, neither correctly to be apprehended by contrasting it with the other as if whichever one was the 'other' was a usus inferior.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • .
  • francis
    Posts: 10,848
    Well, thanks to my good brother and comrade in Christ, (Dr. K as many of us call him) I will not have to post my thinking in my own words as his writing brings far more clarity to my (and a number of other's here) stance concerning the NO.

    My whole argument is exactly as outlined in his article on reductionism. Unfortunately (or fortunately) it draws a line that forces all of us to cross to one side or the other.

    Would you label yourself a reductionist? Do you subscribe to supporting and defending fabrication all at the expense validity?

    http://www.newliturgicalmovement.org/2017/07/the-long-shadow-of-neoscholastic.html?m=1

    I think it is ironic that this article sits on a website titled "The New Liturgical Movement".
    Perhaps they should rename it!

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DohRa9lsx0Q

    O... my... gosh... this vid says it all! Wine and bread around a table with celebrating clowns... and Jesus on the drums! A perfect entrance hymn?!

    Well, I don't know why I came here tonight
    I got the feeling that something ain't right
    I'm so scared in case I fall off my chair
    And I'm wondering how I'll get down the stairs
    Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
    Here I am, stuck in the middle with you

    Yes, I'm stuck in the middle with you
    And I'm wondering what it is I should do
    It's so hard to keep this smile from my face
    Losing control, yeah, I'm all over the place
    Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
    Here I am, stuck in the middle with you

    Well, you started off with nothing
    And you're proud that you're a self-made man
    And your friends they all come crawlin'
    Slap you on the back and say, "Please, please"

    Trying to make some sense of it all
    But I can see it makes no sense at all
    Is it cool to go to sleep on the floor?
    Well, I don't think I can take anymore
    Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
    Here I am, stuck in the middle with you

    Well, you started out with nothing
    And you're proud that you're a self-made man
    And your friends they all come crawlin'
    Slap you on the back and say, "Please, please"

    Yeah, I don't know why I came here tonight
    I got the feeling that something ain't right
    I'm so scared in case I fall off my chair
    And I'm wondering how I'll get down the stairs
    Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right
    Here I am, stuck in the middle with you

    Yes, I'm stuck in the middle with you
    Stuck in the middle with you
    Here I am, stuck in the middle with you


    from wiki

    The video portrays the band performing in a corner of a large, empty building. Their performance is intercut with shots of Egan (who is miming to the by-then-departed Rafferty's vocal track) at a small banquet table with a number of garishly-dressed and made-up supper guests. These include an actual clown, a bespectacled bowler-hatted gent devouring spaghetti and a lavishly dressed woman eating cream cakes and grapes. The clown, who has difficulty eating a plastic chicken, continually squeezes Egan out whenever he tries to take food from the table. The guitar solo is played on a guitar played flat with an empty beer bottle used as a slide. Eventually the other band members appear, driving off the strange characters so that Egan can sit down at last.


    PO

    Valid but possibly illicit. And as a good priest recently explained to a group of us, "Valid is when Jesus shows up. Illicit is when he shows up but he is really ticked."

    You can breathe now.
    Thanked by 1monscarmeli
  • francis
    Posts: 10,848
    Oh... I couldn't figure out the illustration at the top of Dr. K's article until I investigated it a little more. It is an illustration from 1739, Automa.

    Goes along with the phrase, "If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and walks like a duck, it must be a duck."
    Ducks.jpg
    450 x 292 - 28K
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,116
  • rich_enough
    Posts: 1,050
    I feel as if we are arguing about colorization of the movies in the 1980s (remember that)? A large part of the controversy wasn't so much that some people wanted to watch old movies in color, but that the original black and white versions were no longer available. the fact that the older form of the mass was effectively outlawed (and stigmatized) is, I believe, a large part of the traditionalists'' "beef."

    I also think there is a very good case to be made that the OF is really a different rite than the EF. I realize that Benedict XVI said they were "two forms of the Roman rite," but I think that a form of the mass with a different Eucharistic prayer (or at least the option for different prayers), and heavily modified orations, calendar, lectionary, rubrics, legal framework, and spirituality, cannot reasonably be called the same rite.

    Cdl. Ratzinger himself famously described the post-conciliar reforms as constructing a new building out of the pieces of the old one, using new blueprints. Even many of the reformers themselves were not shy in expressing their intentions in changing wholesale what came before. So in a broad sense we are comparing apples and oranges.
  • francis
    Posts: 10,848
    I also think there is a very good case to be made that the OF is really a different rite than the EF. I realize that Benedict XVI said they were "two forms of the Roman rite," but I think that a form of the mass with a different Eucharistic prayer (or at least the option for different prayers), and heavily modified orations, calendar, lectionary, rubrics, legal framework, and spirituality, cannot reasonably be called the same rite.

    EXACTLY!

    So theologically, that means...?
    Thanked by 1mmeladirectress
  • It does seem a valid question that rich_enough raises: what are the determinants of a rite versus a use. We have in the Catholic Church around thirty-plus rites, most of them oriental. In the west we have one rite with several uses which would conform to that rite but have relatively minor variants within it that are not in the 'mother rite'. What, exactly, is meant by 'rite'. Is it form (structure)? Or is the dignity 'rite' determined by other factors unrelated to literary form? The latter would seem to be the case. Who here can speak authoritatively about this? It would, indeed, seem that the EF and the OF (not to mention the OU) are differents rites. Or, it might be argued that since the EF and the OF are basically the same as to form or structure, that the OF is a 'use' (a highly simplified one at that) of the EF. The OU is quite distinct formally from both the EF and the OF, yet it is called a 'use'. Clearly the terms 'rite' and 'use' are not meant to connote a distinct formal structure and literary content, but have their basis in other factors.
    On the other hand, we have the Ambrosian 'rite', not 'use, although it clearly differs from the Roman rite in relatively minor details and would seem to be a 'use' of the parent rite. Ditto the Sarum rite, the Dominican rite, etc.
  • I have at home, here, a wonderful book called A Sense of the Sacred: Roman Catholic Worship in the Middle Ages. It traces (inter alia) the development of most parts of the Mass and the sacraments. I don't recall the author (who also wrote The King's Good Servant making a distinction between rites and uses.....but the history isn't as neat and tidy as some would like it to be.

    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • rich_enough
    Posts: 1,050
    I'm borrowing my ideas from this excellent article by Peter Kwasniewski at the New Liturgical Movement, "The Long Shadow of Neoscholastic Reductionism.")

    Dr. Kwasniewski takes up the very questions posed by M. Jackson Osborn and gives (in my opinion) very intelligent and cogent answers. The article also suggests (in passing) some of the theological connotations of his argument, as suggested by francis. Well worth a read.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • Completely off topic, but....

    Does anyone know How Peter pronounces his family name?
  • I, standing to be corrected, would guess 'KwahzNyOOsskie'.
  • dad29
    Posts: 2,232
    Could as easily be "kwahz-nyehf-sskee." Heard both variants on similar spellings in Milwaukee area.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,116
    Or kvahtz....
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • rich_enough
    Posts: 1,050
    Perhaps the good professor himself could chime in to resolve this bitter controversy!
  • Perhaps the good professor himself could chime in to resolve this bitter controversy!


    Yes, that's what I had in mind, or someone who knows Peter personally and has heard him introduce himself at some forum or other.
  • I think that Dad29 and LIam are correct -
    It's probably KvahzNyEFFskie or KvahzNyEVskie.

    I think that that is how a Slav would pronounce it.
    But, don't we all know that these names often undergo a pronunciational transformation when they get to these shores?

    Many years ago, when I first went to serve my Lutheran friends I thought that I was going to make a good impression by pronouncing all their German names properly. Ha! They were totally bemused and didn't know who I was talking about because all their names had been, much to my dismay and embarrassment, heavily Anglicised.

    I made good friends, though, with a young man in the school who was called Luhdwig. I told him that his name should be pronounced LOOdvig, which he liked much better and told everyone thereafter correctly to say his name.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,116
    KvahtzNyEVskie can become many things. And some will try to recover and revert. My Polish grandfather changed his name to an unrelated Norwegian name that shared an initial letter. It took 90 years to confirm the real name, which was hidden.
  • MatthewRoth
    Posts: 2,367
    Rites are supposed to be complete. Usages are supposed to be derivations and are usually incomplete. But the OP has a rite lacking a pontifical, and Sarum is complete and is technically a derivation of Rome via northern France. So, YMMV.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,220
    To hear Dr. K's name in its original form, with its classic accent mark, check for a sample pronunciation at this Wikipedia page for a Polish politician by the same surname.

    In the International Phonetic Alphabet, it's [kfaɕˈɲɛfskʲi] .

    Notes:
    (1) The "w" in the first syllable becomes unvoiced [f] through the influence of the unvoiced [k] preceding it.
    (2) [ɕ] is a consonant we don't have in English. You can come close to it with the "ch" sound from German ich; or listen to some examples here.
    (3) [ɲ], the palatal nasal consonant, is familiar in Italian bagno and French agneau.

    Now, how much accommodation Peter makes to American speakers and hearers is up to him. For a data point, here's his recent introduction on EWTN.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • Many thanks, Chonak.
    I have been aedified by the segment from EWTN.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    A large part of the controversy wasn't so much that some people wanted to watch old movies in color, but that the original black and white versions were no longer available. the fact that the older form of the mass was effectively outlawed (and stigmatized) is, I believe, a large part of the traditionalists'' "beef."


    I particularly like how you mentioned the effective outlawing and stigmatization of the TLM, and your hypothesis that it may be a major part of the issues that trads have with the NO.
  • To address Clerget's concerns above here.
    I, for one, entertain no stigmatisatioon of those who prefer the EF. It seems to me that what ticks many people off is not the EF itself, but the general failure of EF folk to realise the precepts of the council concerning the public nature of the mass and the nature of general participation in it. Plus, there are those EF folk who, betraying immense spiritual immaturity, think it a 'superior' spirituality and the only true way of worship. One does not, then, hold the EF itself in lower esteem, but does take certain immature adherents of it with a grain of salt, not to mention a deserved 'dismay' at the prevalent extreme clericalism.

    I do understand that those who say that they are blessed to attend EF mass and 'participate' through the medium of their private devotions are profoundly adoring the Almighty. They are not the recipients of stigmas and such - further, they should avoid at all costs the treacherous pride that accompanies real or imagined 'victimhood'. It is incontrovertable, though, that these manners of worship are quite out of step (and deliberately and consciously so) with the precepts of Vatican II, which, one cannot but conclude, they purposefully reject. This is not right. It is wrong.

    Having said all that, one may add that most adherents of the OF and the unfortunate praxes to which they subject it have nary a leg to stand on in the heaping of judgment on anyone else. For different reasons, their manifestations of the unfortunate OF are more reprehensible than anyone else's shortcomings.

    It has been said many times here that the fault is not the OF but what people do to it.
    The very same may be said of the EF.

    The council's precepts of participation are equally relevant to EF and OF.
    1. People's active performance of the dialogue and ordinary and any other parts of the mass that pertain to them.
    2. The sung, fully chanted mass is to be understood as 'normative'. The prevalence of and preference for the 'low mass' amongst EF folk flies in the face of this with the equal impertinence of spoken liturgy amongst OF folk.
    3. We all know what the council said about music, chant, organs, choirs, and people. The prevalence of the 'low mass', again, flies impudently in the face of such admonitions no less than does that of spoken OF worship.

    The above are the council's expectations about The Mass.
    None are exempt from them.
    Thanked by 2CHGiffen Elmar
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,986
    I have nothing at all against the EF. I like the liturgy, but can't stand some of the local EF people - a sentiment I have heard from many others.
  • PaxTecum
    Posts: 315
    Jackson I agree with you.

    I will say, however, that the OF was very poorly "created" out of the 1962 missal. There are a few things that have been taken out or so badly changed that were very beautiful and no longer exist in the OF. (ie: prayers at the food of the alter, offertory prayers, prayers at the priest's communion and what is now called the "Fraction Rite", "agnus dei...dona eis requiem" at the funeral mass, split sanctus/benedictus, need I go on?)

    Perhaps every single one of these things would not have a place in the OF (ie: split sanctus/benedictus due to the addition of the Mystery of Faith) but some of them definitely would. The OF, even celebrated properly, is lacking a certain ceremony, solemnity, and respect for our Lord that is very clearly present at all times in the EF.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    I, for one, entertain no stigmatisatioon of those who prefer the EF. It seems to me that what ticks many people off is not the EF itself, but the general failure of EF folk to realise the precepts of the council concerning the public nature of the mass and the nature of general participation in it. Plus, there are those EF folk who, betraying immense spiritual immaturity, think it a 'superior' spirituality and the only true way of worship. One does not, then, hold the EF itself in lower esteem, but does take certain immature adherents of it with a grain of salt, not to mention deserved 'dismay' at the prevalent extreme clericalism.


    A few things here:

    1. What, specifically, is the public nature of the Mass? That it is the public worship of the Church? How does that relate to the necessity of the participation (see #2) of the congregation?

    2. How is participation defined? Is it only outward signs, such as singing and vocal responses? Is the TLM deficient because it does not overtly foster them?

    3. Please explain “deserved dismay at the prevalent extreme clericalism.” The NO is far more clericalized than the TLM, as the changes in the Mass gave the priest more latitude in how he wants to say it and still have a valid Mass. The TLM does not do this.

    I do understand that those who say that they are blessed to attend EF mass and 'participate' through the medium of their private devotions are profoundly adoring the Almighty. They are not the recipients of stigmas and such - further, they should avoid at all costs the treacherous pride that accompanies real or imagined 'victimhood'. It is incontrovertable, though, that these manners of worship are quite out of step (and deliberately and consciously so) with the precepts of Vatican II, which, one cannot but conclude, they purposefully reject. This is not right. It is wrong.


    1. The quotes around the word “participate” seem to suggest that private devotions and adoration do not constitute participation in the Mass. The Second Vatican Council specifically mentions the fostering of inner participation, and the emphasis on outward signs such as singing and vocal responses has, in practice, served to undermine this desire of the Council.

    2. A tu quoque: There are many practices in the NO that are not in keeping with the desires of the Council, and many of those are deliberate choices made by priests who are purposefully rejecting the wishes of the Council.

    3. Another tu quoque: The Second Vatican Council through the NO has violated several principles of the Council of Trent, as well as other papal decrees such as Quo Primum, Auctorem Fidei, Mirari Vos, and Lamentabili Sane. This is also wrong.

    Having said all that, one may add that most adherents of the OF and the unfortunate praxes to which they subject it have nary a leg to stand on in the heaping of judgment on anyone else. For different reasons, their manifestations of the unfortunate OF are more reprehensible than anyone else's shortcomings.

    It has been said many times here that the fault is not the OF but what people do to it.
    The very same may be said of the EF.


    The NO allows much of the abuse that has been heaped upon it by way of its ambiguous terms such as “pastoral reasons.” To be certain, there are priests who take advantage of these terms, especially as relates to “pastoral reasons,” and providing commentary during the Mass.

    The council's precepts of participation are equally relevant to EF and OF.
    1. People's active performance of the dialogue and ordinary and any other parts of the mass that pertain to them.
    2. The sung, fully chanted mass is to be understood as 'normative'.
    3. We all know what the council said about music, chant, organs, choirs, and people.

    The above are the council's expectations about The Mass.
    None are exempt from them.


    1. The first item on the list originates with Joseph Jungmann’s theory of the role of the laity in the Mass. He felt that the TLM purposefully excluded the laity, and advocated for such changes to the Mass as saying the Canon of the Mass in the loud voice (condemned by Auctorem Fidei and the Council of Trent), and the use of the vernacular (also condemned by Auctorem Fidei and the Council of Trent).

    2. The second item is correct. See #2 above, and also the commentary regarding ambiguous language.

    3. The third item is in keeping with #2 and 3 from above.
  • Clerget -

    I'm not going to counter some of your points, though I could; nor am I going to dispute with you any more about what constitutes participation, and whether it be inner or outer. We all know that there are moments for both at the mass, though I think, at this point, it would be pointless for us further to debate at just what parts of the mass each is appropriate, or to haggle over what constitutes what. I have no doubt that, were we to meet, we could have quite a brotherly discussion about these matters, though our differences are fundamental. So, lest I betray a latent eristical bent, I respectfully abstain from further faultfinding or point-making.
    Thanked by 2CharlesW Elmar
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,986
    However, as I said above, most OF people haven't room to fault anyone else for their ritual shortcomings - so I'm not stigmatising EF folk.


    There are faults to be found in both rites. One EF fault I note is a near adoration of the Council of Trent. Why? It was a council, like other councils. No better, no worse, and no more binding on future councils than any other. Any council would have the authority to set aside ritual promulgated by a previous council. Note I did not say doctrine, but ritual practice. Granted, as an Easterner, I don't even consider it ecumenical, but that is another issue. You know how those self-absorbed Latins think everything is about them and all their councils are ecumenical and relevant to all.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • Elmar
    Posts: 506
    Jackson,

    ... heard of EF folk who harp on the EF's 'superior spirituality' ... those who claim a 'superior spirituality' seem unaware of the utter incongruity of those two words' juxtaposition.

    ... they should avoid at all costs the treacherous pride that accompanies real or imagined 'victimhood'


    Fully agree. As an aside, I have to remember from time to time that the last sentence also holds in first person singular ...

    most OF people haven't room to fault anyone else for their ritual shortcomings

    You catch me.
  • rich_enough
    Posts: 1,050
    It seems to me that what ticks many people off is not the EF itself, but the general failure of EF folk to realise the precepts of the council concerning the public nature of the mass and the nature of general participation in it.

    You're losing me here. Apart from a over-generalized characterization of those who prefer the EF as lost in their private devotions during the mass. I don't see any argument that the EF does not foster true participation. All the popes from Pius X to John XXIII certainly thought so.

    Plus, there are those EF folk who, betraying immense spiritual immaturity, think it a 'superior' spirituality and the only true way of worship. One does not, then, hold the EF itself in lower esteem, but does take certain immature adherents of it with a grain of salt,

    The argument is that the EF more fully embodies and expresses the nature of the what is going on in the liturgy than the OF. It's not a matter of a arguing for a "superior spirituality" in the sense that the Dominican charism could be "superior" to the Benedictine, but rather that the EF fosters a greater awareness and understanding of the liturgical action.

    The fact that many traditionalists may (or may not) have certain attitudes is not an argument against the EF. (I could point to examples of condescension and superior attitudes from those who prefer the OF, which would show exactly nothing.) The stigmatization I'm talking about concerns the rite itself, not so much its adherents. So I find it a little odd to say that you "entertain no stigmatisation of those who prefer the EF," yet do entertain what I would consider unfair and inaccurate ideas about them.
  • StimsonInRehabStimsonInRehab
    Posts: 1,934
    One EF fault I note is a near adoration of the Council of Trent.


    Not necessarily. I have great admiration for the Council of Florence. :D
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,986
    I quit paying any attention to those councils after Nicea II. From a practical standpoint, I suppose one could say Vatican II was more "ecumenical" in representation than councils after Nicea II.

    I understand the point Jackson is making. It is clear that more than one pope desired more congregational participation than occurs at many EF masses.

    By the time of Florence, the popes were moving toward becoming temporal monarchs, even assuming powers that had belonged to the emperor, such as authority to convene a council. Most of the east would accept a papacy that functioned as it did in the first millennium when popes were not monarchs, but symbols of unity.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    I understand the point Jackson is making. It is clear that more than one pope desired more congregational participation than occurs at many EF masses.


    I would like to know more about this. Which popes and in which encyclicals did they indicate as such?
  • Elmar
    Posts: 506
    The fact that many traditionalists may (or may not) have certain attitudes is not an argument against the EF

    Not an argument per se, but it discourages people who know nothing but 'their' NO mass from getting interested in the TLM and discovering its spiritual merits.
    And that is of course very, very sad.

    As I said above, we have a TLM group in our parish for years, but they have chosen to close themselves off, rather than at least try to inspire others. Apparently our pastor has chosen to keep it like this ... opposite to what pope Benedict XVI mandated.
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,986

    I would like to know more about this. Which popes and in which encyclicals did they indicate as such?


    With the publication of the Apostolic Constitution Divini Cultus (1928), there is no doubt that the Liturgical Movement started to slide dramatically in the direction of Vatican II. In it, Pope Pius XI specifically recommended the “active participation” of the congregation in the liturgy:

    “In order that the faithful may more actively participate in divine worship, let them be made once more to sing the Gregorian Chant, so far as it belongs to them to take part in it.”

    Interesting that the "dialogue mass" gets attributed by some to Pius X, who as best I can tell, had no association with it.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    As I said above, we have a TLM group in our parish for years, but they have chosen to close themselves off, rather than at least try to inspire others. Apparently our pastor has chosen to keep it like this ... opposite to what pope Benedict XVI mandated.


    A few things:

    1. Did the TLM group choose on their own to close themselves off from the beginning, or did something happen that provoked that response?

    2. This is completely anecdotal: I think your pastor has chosen to keep the status quo because it's easier than trying to re-integrate the two groups into one cohesive parish, especially if something happened in the past that closed them off from one another.

    3. This is also completely anecdotal: As with many things in the NO, the "mandate" from B16 is treated like it is just a "suggestion," and it doesn't have to be followed if the priest doesn't feel like it.
  • Liam
    Posts: 5,116
    But Pope St Pius X's sacramental revolution (part which was a long long long delayed completion of the Council of Trent, something largely forgotten) anticipated things (once people (and younger) were being exhorted to frequent communion during Mass, other questions about their integral participation in the Mass followed). It's one reason some more-traddie-than-thou folks pointed to his pontificate as the camel's nose under the liturgical praxis tent.
  • Clerget.....

    To borrow an idea from (inter alia) Fr. John Zuhlsdorf.... the plural of anecdote is data.

    I completely agree that what we have described here is anecdotal, in the sense of a story without context.

    On the other hand, I have noticed that two kinds of attitudes exist in these bifurcated circumstances:

    1) "They're basically the same, so why don't you do things our way this time and we'll do things your way next time" (This is also present in "oecumenical" gatherings.

    2) "Hell, no!"
  • dad29
    Posts: 2,232
    "dialogue mass" gets attributed by some to Pius X, who as best I can tell, had no association with it


    I thought it was Pius XII. But a lot was going on during the reign of PioX, and perhaps the 'dialog Mass' was allowed by indult--which may not have required his signature
  • CharlesW
    Posts: 11,986

    I thought it was Pius XII.


    It was, but I have been told by several people that it was Pius X. They were wrong about that.
  • ClergetKubiszClergetKubisz
    Posts: 1,912
    “In order that the faithful may more actively participate in divine worship, let them be made once more to sing the Gregorian Chant, so far as it belongs to them to take part in it.”


    But even this has not been realized. It is in SC and the GIRM, however, like I said in the previous post, there are other options available, and the priest has the right to choose whichever he wishes from them, for whatever reason.

    As for Divini Cultus, I think the entire document needs to be reviewed, especially by the clergy, and put into practice. There are some solid points in there regarding sacred music. It does represent a shift in the direction of the Novus Ordo because with its call for the faithful to sing Gregorian Chant during the liturgy, it opens the door for the dialogue Mass, which is the gateway to the Novus Ordo.