Mistake 1, The TLM is only 400 years old.
Mistake 2, The Trent Missal was a universal reform.
Mistake 3, The Latin used in the Mass was a vernacular... Someone needs to read Christine Mohrmann's work on this subject.

I am only about halfway through and the art of being wrong is strong.

(Hopefully this thread will disappear quickly so we will not have yet another thread with the same arguments going back and forth with more heat than light being generated)

here's some dry ice...

The TLM will never end... the NO will not last. Check back to this thread in a decade or two.

@MarkB
1. The Trent Missal is the older Missal of the Canons of Rome. Quote below from Fr. Hunwicke,

Two BIG UNTRUTHS in particular are told about [S Pius V], poor fellow.
Lie Number 1: he issued a radically revised version of the Roman Missal, just as S Paul VI was to do after Vatican II.
Fact: S Pius's edition of the Missal was so light a revision that it was still possible, after its promulgation, to continue to use your old Missal.
Lie Number 2: although permitting some exceptions, S Pius ordered his edition to be used by everybody.
Fact: he ORDERED all rites older than 200 years to be kept in use. (He only permitted churches with 200-year-old-or-more rites to change over to his own new edition if the Diocesan Bishop and the unanimous chapter agreed).

2. The Trent Missal was not a universal reform... from Fr. Hunwicke

QUO PRIMUM: THE RIGHT ARGUMENT
[...] we need to be quite clear what S Pius actually said. Please bear with me.
[...] some [...] are currently writing as if S Pius V in 1570 "permitted" rites with more than 200 years behind them to continue. He did not. He ORDERED such old rites to be continued. Nequaquam auferimus were his words ... auferimus means "we take away", nequaquam means "not at all".

What he did allow was his own new 1570 Edition to be brought into use if a bishop and his entire Chapter agreed. [...] That's what S Pius V mandated.

Even if [the one member of the chapter that objected] dies [... the] Bishop still isn't obliged to bring in the new Missal. What S Pius V says is "permittimus". That means "we permit". 'Permitto' is nice old-fashioned Latin verb that popes quite often used, once upon a time. It's still in some of the more old-fashioned dictionaries.

SO: ONE SINGLE OFF-MESSAGE OLD MAN AND HIS VETO COULD PRESERVE THE LOCAL TRADITION OF HIS PARTICULAR CHURCH. THAT'S HOW STRONGLY S PIUS V BELIEVED IN TRADITION.

3. Fr. Hunwicke expertly quotes from the foremost expert in the field Christine Mohrmann, but anybody interested in Liturgy and it's development should read her research in full.

Writing in 1959, something like a decade before the Novus Ordo Mass was rendered into the impoverished English of Old ICEL, Christine Mohrmann showed that the very nature of Christian liturgical language, from the earliest times, had been sacral and hieratic. "Christians sought for prayer forms which were far removed, in their style and mode of expression, from the language of everyday life. This tendency was combined with a conscious striving after sacral forms of expression". Taking the Didache , that strange early text sometimes admired by liturgists unsympathetic to what were to be the classical forms of East and West, she shows "a linking up with the Old Testament sentence structure and parallelism - such as we find also in the New Testament Canticles and prayers, and ... the introduction of Aramaic and Hebrew elements which clearly indicate a striving after sacral stylisation. There is here an obvious differentiation from the language of everyday life ...". Moving on to the introduction of Latin into the worship of the Church, she demonstrates, as I showed in an earlier post, that the dialect deliberately constructed for this purpose was deliberately archaic and sacral; based upon those pagan Roman formulae of immemorial antiquity by which fields were lustrated or the gods of an enemy city persuaded to desert it. The "monumental verbosity coupled with juridical precision ... wealth of words ... parallelism, alliteration and rhyme ... " in the pagan formulae are to be found, above all, in the Canon of the Mass. " A sacral style has been created which links up with the old Roman prayer of the official Roman cult". One finds oneself idly wondering if the members of old ICEL were ignorant of Mohrmannn's weighty arguments, or whether for their own doctrinal-cultural reasons had decided deliberately to ignore her findings.

How confident are you that the anti-TLM movement aligns with the priorities of the Lord Jesus?

I would ask the same of some of the extremist circles within TLM-land.

Guys, can we just stop this stuff for now please? It's unproductive.

“Don't feed the trolls."

the Tridentine Mass, the Missal of Pius V, the Missal that traditional Catholics want to revert to, is only about 400 years old, even though many components of that Missal have earlier origins.

There seems to be some confusion of terms which should be sorted out.

The Roman Missal traditional Catholics mainly use and subject to the norms issued on July 16, 2021, by Pope is merely 60 years old (i.e. Editio typica of 1962). There are likely some copies of the previous edition in use. Tridentine edition of 1570 is probably used by nobody now.

As to the content, the Tridentine Missal is largely a re-issue of the pre-Tridentine Missal of Roman Curia, as the editors of the Novus Ordo testify (GIRM, 7): "In fact, the Missal of 1570 differs very little from the very first printed edition of 1474, which in turn faithfully takes up again the Missal used in the time of Pope Innocent III." The latter, in turn, goes back to the Gregorian sacramentary (the oldest copy we have is made in early 9th c.), Ordo romanus I, the earliest preserved chant books (from late 9th c.), lectionaries (7th-8th c.), calendars (4th c., according to card. Schuster). Thus the Mass "traditional Catholics want to revert to" is a lot more than 400 years old.

In addition, the use of Roman Curia is just a member of large family of uses of the traditional Roman rite which, at least regarding Mass, are similar and largely compatible and were in principle allowed to exist further by the tridentine legislation.

The Council of Trent called for reform of the Mass to include the congregation (Session XXII, ch 6 & ch. 8), as well as decluttering and resourcement.

Session XXII, or other sessions, did not call for any change in the texts or rubrics of liturgical books. The reforms were mainly directed to improving ars celebrandi, preaching, eradicating abuses, recommending Communion by the faithful at Mass. Could not find anything on decluttering and resourcement there.

Ok, Stimson, but as I said recently in another context, attempts to make the celebration of the Mass (or the Mass itself) "relevant" and "up-to-date" somehow miss the fact that the faith is ALWAYS relevant and up-to-date.

Don9of11,

If we grant that the Pope believes seriously that his broad pastoral program is correct, of God, and good for the Church,

and if we look at where the opposition to his program, preaching, and person, has come from most stridently,

and, most proximately, if we consider that two prominent online activists conspired to disrupt in a very brazen way his high-profile Amazon synod with a public and deliberately viral act of defiance that required the Pope himself to publicly apologize to the Amazonian representatives for the inundation of the statue,

then it becomes quite obvious why the Pope would view the trad Mass as problematic, and also why he would see tightly restricting it, and removing its theoretical foundation (as an equal expression of the lex credendi of the Roman Rite, and as a "legitimate aspiration," rather than a reluctant concession), as a really easy way to root out the opposition within the Church to what he feels is the important work he is doing.

It makes perfect sense and, for me, after the highly visible, boldly public, theatrical conduct of certain online trads in opposition to the Amazon Synod, seemed almost inevitable.

The real question at issue is:

- Can the faith change?

Libs (?Papa Bergolio?) say yes, and it did.
Trads say it can’t, and shouldn’t.
Papa Ratzinger says it can’t, and it didn’t.

The forms of mass that are allowed and/or promulgated by any of these parties are simply reflections of their position on this fundamental question.

Some have said that in formulating TC Pope Francis was largely prompted by the US bishops at their ad limina visit. That seems plausible to me, the English and French hierarchies generally have taken a low profile "no need for that here" attitude. And I see that the Summorum Pontificum annual pilgrimage this year included Pontifical Vespers at the Pantheon celebrated by Cdl Zuppi, president of the Italian Bishops' conference, and Solemn Mass in St Peter's celebrated by an official of DDWDS.

I think it plausible that Nihil is onto something, generically, and I had to reread his posts to digest them properly. Where I struggle is the fact that the supposed Vicar of Christ (a title he himself refuses to use) saw no apparent problem in literal, plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face idolatry. Say what you want about the antipathy of trads, the man who holds claim to the Petrine office just sat idly by and watched bishops carry a literal pagan idol up to the baldacchino in St. Peter’s as though it were of no more importance than the way the hot dog vender outside in the square handed out napkins.

“Rome will lose the faith.”

Indeed, she has.

@MJO

Historically, we have had too many popes who have led lives that made them plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face unbelievable as the 'Vicar of Christ', haven't we?

This is a sign for us that we are members of the One, True, Church. Any purely human endeavour run by men of the caliber of the Hierarchy both past and present would have collapsed centuries ago.

N.B. Pope Francis is of the generation of clerics fast disappearing that really believed that Vatican II and its spirit was a force for the good and would bring abundant fruits. It is difficult to change tack when you have been sailing for so long in one direction.
Just like Paul VI he has been liberal in his personal permissions granting exceptions to his general wish for the future of the Church. Also refighting the Liturgy wars is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on the RMS Titanic, the vocations crisis iceberg should be the focus.

Historically, we have had too many popes who have led lives that made them plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face unbelievable as the 'Vicar of Christ', haven't we?

generically this is indeed true, but at least they didn’t permit blatant demonic idolatry; or (as happened a week ago) formally counsel people to NOT share the faith (a blatant repudiation of the great commission). They were sinners and had concubines and the like, but they still propped up the faith writ large, or at least didn’t seek to impede it. There is a difference of kind with Francis. It’s not merely a sinful man, but a man who is actively undermining the faith itself, and the faithful too.

Andris Amolins - Unfortunately that article contains an important error :

As a result, John Paul II universalized the Agatha Christie Indult in 1984.

But this is simply not true. The indult granted to Cardinal Heenan for England and Wales is perfectly clear that what was permitted was a continuation of the Mass as existing at the start of 1969 (the missal antecedent to the reform 0f 1969). This was exactly the same specification as the indult for aged and infirm priests. The relevant text is

The edition of the Missal to be used on these occasions should be that published again by the Decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites (27 January 1965), and with the modifications indicated in the Instructio altera (4 May 1967).

The significance of this is that the 1965 publication embodies many of the reforms called for by VII, largely by changes to the rubrics, changes to the text are slight omissions. The 1984 indult in Quattuor abhinc annos negates all that, in effect rejecting the reforms called for by VII (and also by Trent). 1965
[ADDED]From March 7th 1965 the unamended 1962 rubrics were illicit everywhere, until October 3rd 1984, that is a long time.

From the Synthesis of the Synod Listening Sessions of the Diocese of Covington

Others responded
that the homily needs to
relate/translate to today. It needs to tell
us what we need to do to become a
better person. They don't want to be
told every year why we use A, B, C
synoptic gospels with John thrown in at
certain times. They want to know how
the readings relate to their life today.
They are looking for a priest who
inspires them.

Liturgy is either a place where we meet the Lord, or a source of endless distraction by passing on arcane trivialia and specialized knowledge. This can be true of either form of the Rite. This Lectionary thing really resonated with me when I read it for some reason. It may be that I hear from partisans of the liturgical reform so often about the triumph of the three-year cycle, as a way to meet Our Lord more deeply in His Word. And yet, how often it seems that, rather than meeting the Lord Who gave us the gift of the Scriptures the Lectionary contains, we are made to meet Annibale Bugnini by hearing, yet again, more about the Lectionary that contains the Word, than the Word it contains.

Whilst the liturgy is an objective act of worship, the challenge is for the liturgy to be also a vehicle for the subjective acts of worship of those assisting. Worship is a dratted intangible thing. But I think it begins inevitably with charity.

We've always recognized that this requires liturgical formation, and over the long history, that true unity in charity requires objective standards (not inflexibly applied to different pastoral situations, of course, but strong enough to exert a gravitational pull even on the most extreme exceptions that are made to them in any given time or place) that render us all equally accountable to them, to express the universality of the Church across time and space, and to sidestep the congregationalist power struggles and worship wars that needlessly tear apart communities in the Protestant world, and now increasingly do so in Catholic parish life.

Earlier in this thread, Don9of11 indicated that, as a traditionalist, I was upset "because the Pope told me something I didn't want to hear," whereas I would have been delighted, he supposed, at the universal implementation of the Missal of Pius V. That's not quite the rub. For a start, I think the universal implementation of the old Missal on the whole Church from the top down would be a gross miscarriage of charity, and I would not support it. But he's also wrong, I think, about what upsets me about the changing stance of the Vatican on the old Mass.

It's like this: just like many traditionalists, I have found refuge in the older rites, with their sterner rules and deliberate communities, from the liturgical culture of a wider Church that has, to all intents and purposes, "let herself go" in terms of the objective expectations for worship. This was a refuge, not a hiding place -- throughout all this time I have been active in trying to build the musico-liturgical culture of the modern Rites, in charity and pastoral sensitivity.

I have worked and continue to work gladly in both worlds, and I have certainly experienced highs and lows in each. But in the world of the new rite, on the level of the parish, diocese, nation, and world, one really gets the sense of quot capita, tot sententiae in terms of how Mass should sound, look, be celebrated -- in short, every external. Sometimes, the prevailing local custom is so contrary to the historic forms of the liturgy that, even working with a supportive pastor, with a supportive bishop above him, you seem like a weirdo from outer space trying to use even a little chant (pride of place my Balaam's...) within a musico-liturgical framework that ranges from the oppressively grandiose (I think of the "cathedral standard"), to the Broadway-esque (here's to you, CCLM tunesmiths), to a second-rate rock 'n' roll concert, to a 60's counterculture teach-in with Petrine, Pauline, and Marian folk music. All of which, by the way, I find difficult venues to pray in (as with the New Rite more generally, even when done with generous chanting to what I shall call orthodox seminary standards -- and no, it's not just about quiet time, and yes, I love the Byzantine Rite, busy and noisy as it is... but that's for another day).

So, finding an approved Catholic rite with a certain stability and objectivity, in which controversy tended to be at least more specifically "in the box," if not outright minimized, in which I could sing plainsong without afflicting people (mostly) and which provided the space and environment to engage deeply and prayerfully with the liturgy, was a God-send. I found it in 2005. In 2007, I could suddenly find it even more. And I have lived with it to my great edification since that time. All-in-all, 17 years, or more than half of my life. For some people, even those significantly older than me, with ecclesiastical approval, this has been the way of worship of their whole life, and the idea of "return" to the novus Ordo is as transparently absurdist as the idea of "returning" a congregation of 21st Century Lutherans to a Catholic Church that they personally never left.

And yet, this is the language we now have to live with. Indeed, now, with only marginal (although tangible) improvement in the implementation of the newer Rites in a way that jives with the received musical and liturgical culture of the Western Church, I am told that my refuge is to be systematically suppressed by my shepherds (under orders from SheepFold CentCom), with pretty much no guarantee that anything will be systematically done to ensure that the particular environment so naturally accruing to the usus antiquior, thanks to those mean old rigid books that have been so good to me, will be preserved in the actual lived experience of the newer Rite.

And that's why I'm mad. Because lots of people have been very derelict in their duty, and there seems to be diminishing escape from the direct detrimental effect of their decades of acedia on my personal experience of liturgical prayer.

Alas 'twas ever thus.

no merely human institution conducted with such knavish imbecility would have lasted a fortnight. H Belloc

More

The authors claim the liturgical reform was “Spirit-anointed.”

I don’t see how anyone with an in-depth history and understanding of the workings of the Concilium and Annibale Bugnini, and how much duping of Paul VI happened when it came to making the New Mass, can make that claim.

As I recall, Jesus went into the house of Matthew, quite the scandal in those days. I also seem to recall also that He said, he would go into any home where he was invited. I bet He has been in some pretty wretched places.

In the interests of completeness here is Peter Kwasniewski response to the above article,
https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2022/11/earlier-today-dr.html#more
He also links to my friend Dr. Shaw's commentary...

he asked something that is hard for you to hear, and you can't accept it.

Were it only about the Mass!!

Tomjaw: in that Rorate piece, you'll find links to several different essays on the topic. Click on the link specifying Cdl. Stickler and your eyes will be opened. The intent of the Council Fathers was directly subverted (perverted may be a better word) by Bugnini and his Cardinal-mentor.

Since the 1962 Rite (1964 editio) was NOT abrogated, using that Missal and its rubrics could not be 'illicit' no matter following documentation's text.

If you read the Rorate/Kwasniewski piece referenced above and the Stickler document (link embedded in that piece), you'll find that B-16's 12 (?) man commission voted 11-1 that the 1962/64 was not abrogated.

I will grant you that these are canonically technical terms and that I am not a canon lawyer. But the treatment of SSPX is similarly cloudy, with the word "irregular" applied, rather than "schismatic."

Further:

Salza and Siscoe, in chapter 16 of their book True or False Pope, also demonstrate that the new missal was never promulgated in such a way that its use was canonically obligatory...

Same link, same essay.

Here's a thought:

Bishops: 1. Permit and encourage parishes to have celebrations of the mass in Latin according to the Missal of St. Paul VI, said ad orientem with chanted ordinaries and propers.

2. Actually include enough Latin in masses on a regular basis so that the people can say or sing together those parts of the mass which pertain to them in Latin. (Imagine diocesan celebrations where all the people participate fully, actively and consciously by saying or singing together the responses comfortably in a single language),

3. Crack down on obvious liturgical abuses in the Novus Ordo which detract from the solemnity of the mass. Issue stern warnings. If a priest persists in clown masses, etc. he finds himself assigned to the missions or somewhere else less agreeable than his present assignment.

Traditionalists: While understanding that the Missal of Paul VI is not the Missal of Pius V, understand that a mass said in Latin according to the Missal of Paul VI, said ad orientem, with chant gives you 95% of what you want.