Having previously written for CWR what I think a very strong defense of communities where the so-called Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) or the “extraordinary form of the Roman Rite” are the norm, you might think me sympathetic to the anxiety aroused by the new motu proprio issued by Pope Francis largely rescinding the liberal provisions made in Summorum Pontificum(whose author I defended here).
In truth, I am ambivalent. Most of my ambivalence has to do with online “traditionalists” indulging in the transparently tendentious uses and abuses of history that I have attempted to treat on CWR here and here. These are serious historiographical errors that cannot be left tolerated and unchecked. Traditionalists who continue to indulge and promote them lose otherwise staunch allies such as myself in an instant—and never faster than when complaining about Vatican II as some kind of “chosen trauma.” It is nothing of the sort, and I greatly welcome what the council did, especially in relations with the East, which I have treated about in great detail elsewhere.
My sympathy is further depleted by recalling how, over the last 400 years, the liturgical needs and requests of Eastern Catholics such as myself have been treated as playthings by not just Roman authorities but local Latin clergy as well. Latin intransigence and chauvinism when confronted with requests for legitimate local diversity have been around for centuries, as we Eastern Catholics know only too well. The fact that proponents of the TLM are now tasting it again, after a few years of freedom, can only invite thoughts of doctors being poor patients when they, too, must take bitter potions and pills.
Latin chauvinism is not just confined to the endlessly recycled tales of intrigues in Eastern Europe after the Reformation. For over a century now it has marked, and still marks, this country as well, especially when it comes to the treatment of married Eastern Catholic clergy, as I show in my new book, Married Priests in the Catholic Church. I wish we could write all this off as in the past, but as I have shown on CWR previously it is still very much alive.
Nevertheless, this should not prevent all concerned Catholics from joining hands in confessing that we are, and cannot but be, deeply ambivalent about the current state of the papacy, and for good reason. I wrote about that ambivalence here and more bluntly here. To paraphrase Gerald Ford, a papacy big enough to give you what you want is also powerful enough to take away what you love. Those who rejoiced in Pope Benedict XVI promulgating Summorum are now mourning Pope Francis promulgating Traditionis Custodes. Thus does one see anew what I called the promise and perils of papal populism.
Papal populism is a guilty pleasure of us all. Some of us are in favor of the pope when he’s writing letters to Fr James Martin about LGBTQ issues; others when he’s issuing denunciations about “gender ideology” and abortion.
But populism is no way to run anything. Is there any way out of this?
I think there is a way forward, but it is a way of askesis and apophaticism, involving massive and massively kenotic self-denial on all our parts, resulting in that much “smaller” Church we often hear about in comments made by a young Joseph Ratzinger, but here understood much differently.
Let me stipulate here my central claim: an overlarge and overweening papacy is found in nobody’s idea of “tradition”—neither Latin nor Byzantine, neither ancient nor early modern. It should be regarded as utterly indefensible today, and everyone of us should be looking to restrict and restrain it at every turn, regardless of our liturgical proclivities or traditions. Here is where those of us in the East can easily join hands anew with Latin Christians by reminding the latter that the post-1870 papacy is seriously at odds with the developed tradition up to that point, and the post-1870 papacy poses near-insuperable obstacles to not just ecumenism but also to reform within the Catholic Church as a whole.
Ultramontanism and papal centralization are enemies of the common good of the entire Church as such.
What can be done about such things? I have attempted on CWR over the years to call for papal slenderizing in several ways. One relatively easy way to begin would be to ensure that regular papal interviews are scrapped.
More broadly—and with increasing levels of difficulty, I admit—we would not want to continue to have an overlarge Roman Curia for reasons I suggested here. Such shrinkage, I suggested here, would itself require a massive and long-term rethinking of ecclesial (especially episcopal) structures towards the kind of accountability the Catholic Church uniquely and scandalous lacks today more than any other comparable institution. Such a rethinking would require abandoning shoddy notions of “sovereignty.”
The single biggest and most far-reaching change is one many “traditionalists” have been inclined to sneer at, not least since it has been so vigorously promoted by Pope Francis: genuine synodality, but not of the sort we have had with him and his predecessors, which is a sham. Instead, we need real, regular, and top-to-bottom exercises of legitimate synodality properly understood. Such synodality would also require recognizing that the laics are not some optional add-on to a church run exclusively by clerics, but must be included in all structures of governance with equal voice and vote. (I elaborated all this in considerable detail in my 2019 book Everything Hidden Shall Be Revealed: Ridding the Church of Abuses of Sex and Power.)
The point of these restrictions—and still others desperately needed—is to return health to the Church by stopping the constant focus on, and abuses of power by, the papacy. It has grown so vast and powerful that what is envisaged is not merely a clipping of wings, but their entire removal. No bishop of Rome now or in the past has any legitimate business in flitting about determining how a parish in Montreal or Melbourne or Mumbai or Moscow should celebrate the liturgy. That is up to them and their pastor in communion with the bishop (in communion with the bishop of Rome who, as Adrian Fortescue acidly noted just over a century ago, should be too busy tending his own flock in the central Italian peninsula to be trying to boss anybody else around.)
If we really had such structures, then local communities would rightly have much more control over not just the forms of their liturgical celebration, but also parish and diocesan finances, the election of bishops, and many other things found in both Eastern and Western tradition but currently lost to us.
But getting to the point when such structures and their healthful fruits are commonplace will require enormous work on our part, building long-term alliances between previously unlikely and sometimes openly hostile parties on the peripheries of the Catholic Church—those of us in the East, and those in the West in various TLM communities and orders who have hitherto shown neither talent nor interest in such alliances.
Are we all condemned, then, to shout ourselves hoarse in our little enclaves of irrelevance while the papacy continually fattens itself on its own eminence until it becomes morbidly obese, killing us all?
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Dr. Adam A. J. DeVille is associate professor at the University of Saint Francis in Ft. Wayne, IN., where he also maintains a part-time private practice in psychotherapy. He is the author and editor of several books, including Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy (University of Notre Dame, 2011).
Rome Newsroom, Jul 21, 2021 / 12:00 pm (CNA).
Cardinal Joseph Zen published a statement on Wednesday, saying that new restrictions on the celebration of Traditional Latin Masses are a “blow,” even if they wer… […]
Maureen McKinley milks one of her family’s goats in their backyard with help from three of her children, Madeline (behind), Fiona and Augustine on Monday, Aug. 2, 2021. McKinley and her family own two goats, chickens, a rabbit, and a dog. / Jake Kelly
Denver Newsroom, Aug 10, 2021 / 16:32 pm (CNA).
With five children ages 10 and under to care for, and a pair of goats, a rabbit, chickens and a dog to tend to, Maureen and Matt McKinley rely on a structured routine to keep their busy lives on track.
Chores, nap times, scheduled story hours – they’re all important staples of their day. But the center of the McKinleys’ routine, what focuses their family life and strengthens their Catholic faith, they say, is the Traditional Latin Mass.
Its beauty, reverence, and timelessness connect them to a rich liturgical legacy that dates back centuries.
“This is the Mass that made so many saints throughout time,” observes Maureen, 36, a parishioner at Mater Misericordiæ Catholic Church in Phoenix.
“You know what Mass St. Alphonsus Ligouri, St. Therese, St. Teresa of Avila and St. Augustine were attending? The Traditional Latin Mass,” Maureen says.
“We could have a conversation about it, and we would have all experienced the exact same thing,” she says. “That’s exciting.”
Recent developments in the Catholic Church, however, have curbed some of that excitement. On July 16, Pope Francis released a motu proprio titled Traditiones custodis, or “Guardians of the Tradition”, that has cast doubt on the future of the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) – and deeply upset and confused many of its devotees.
Pope Francis’ directive rescinds the freedom Pope Benedict XVI granted to priests 14 years ago to say Masses using the Roman Missal of 1962, the form of liturgy prior to Vatican II, without first seeking their bishop’s approval. Under the new rules, bishops now have the “exclusive competence” to decide where, when, and whether the TLM can be said in their dioceses.
In a letter accompanying the motu proprio, Pope Francis maintains that the faculties granted to priests by his predecessor have been “exploited to widen the gaps, reinforce the divergences, and encourage disagreements that injure the Church, block her path, and expose her to the peril of division.”
Using the word “unity” a total of 15 times in the accompanying letter, the pope suggests that attending the TLM is anything but unifying, going so far as to correlate a strong personal preference for such masses with a rejection of Vatican II.
Weeks later, many admirers of the “extraordinary” form of the Roman rite – the McKinleys among them – are still struggling to wrap their minds and hearts around the pope’s order, and the pointed tone he used to deliver it.
Maureen McKinley says she had never considered herself a “traditionalist Catholic” before. Instead, she says she and her husband have just “always moved toward the most reverent way to worship and the best way to teach our children.”
“It didn’t feel like I became a particular type of Catholic by going to Mater Misericordiæ. But since the motu proprio came out, I feel like I have been categorized, like I was something different, something other than the rest of the Church,” she says.
“It feels like our Holy Father doesn’t understand this whole group of people who love our Lord so much.”
McKinley isn’t alone in feeling this way. Sadness, anger, frustration, and disbelief are some common themes in conversations among those who regularly attend the TLM.
They want to understand and support the Holy Father, but they also see the restriction as unnecessary, especially when plenty of other more pressing issues in the Church abound.
Eric Matthews, another Mater Misericordiæ parishioner, views the new restrictions as an “attack on devout Catholic culture,” citing the beauty that exists across the rites recognized within the Church. There are seven rites recognized in the Catholic Church: Latin, Byzantine, Alexandrian or Coptic, Syriac, Armenian, Maronite, and Chaldean.
“It’s the same Mass,” says Matthews, 39, who first discovered the TLM about eight years ago. “It’s just different languages, different cultures, but the people that you have there are there for the right reasons.”
Different paths to the TLM
The pope’s motu proprio directly affects a tiny fraction of U.S. Catholics – perhaps as few as 150,000, or less than 1 percent of some 21 million regular Mass-goers, according to some estimates. According to one crowd-sourced database, only about 700 venues – compared to over 16,700 parishes nationwide – offer the TLM.
Also, since the motu proprio’s release July 16, only a handful of bishops have stopped the TLM in their dioceses. Of those bishops who have made public responses, most are allowing the Masses to continue as before – in some cases because they see no evidence of disunity, and in others because they need more time to study the issue.
But for those who feel drawn to the TLM – for differing reasons that have nothing to do with a rejection of Vatican II – it feels as if the ground has shifted under their feet.
Maureen McKinley wants her children to understand the importance of hard work, of which they have no shortage when it comes to their urban farm. After morning prayer, Maureen milks the family’s goats with the help of the children. Madeline (age 10) feeds the bunny; Augustine (7) exercises the dog; John (6) checks for eggs from the chickens; and Michael (4) helps anyone he chooses.
With a noisy clatter in the kitchen, the McKinleys eat breakfast, tidy up their rooms, and begin their daily activities. They break at 11 a.m. to head to daily Mass at Mater Misericordiæ, an apostolate of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP), where they first attended two years ago.
Matt, 34, wanted to know how the early Christians worshipped.
“The funny thing about converts is they’re always wanting more,” says Maureen, who was, at first, a little resistant to the idea of attending the TLM because she didn’t know Latin. “Worship was a big part of his conversion.”
Maureen agreed to follow her husband’s lead, and they continued to attend the TLM. What kept them coming back week after week was the reverence for the Eucharist.
“Matt had a really hard time watching so many people receive communion in the hand at the other parish,” says Maureen. “He says he didn’t want our kids to think that that was the standard. That’s the exception to the rule, not the rule.”
Reverence in worship also drew Elizabeth Sisk to the TLM. A 28-year-old post-anesthesia care unit nurse, she attends both the Novus Ordo, the Mass promulgated by St. Paul VI in 1969, and the extraordinary form in Raleigh, North Carolina, where her parish, the Holy Name of Jesus Cathedral, offers the TLM on the first Sunday of the month.
Sisk has noticed recently that more people in her area — especially young people who are converts to Catholicism — are attending both forms of the Mass. While the Novus Ordo is what brought many of them, herself included, to the faith, she feels that the extraordinary form invites them to go deeper.
“We want to do something radical with our lives,” Sisk says. “To be Catholic right now as a young person is a really radical decision. I think the people who choose to be Catholic right now, we’re all in. We don’t want ‘watered-down’ Catholicism.”
With the lack of Christian values in the world today, Sisk desires “something greater,” which she says she can tell is happening in the TLM.
Many TLM parishes saw an increase in attendance during the pandemic, as they were often the only churches open while many others shut their doors or held Masses outside. This struck some as controversial, if not disobedient to the local government. For others, it was a saving grace to have access to the sacraments.
The priests at Erin Hanson’s parish obtained permission from the local bishop to celebrate Mass all day, every day, with 10 parishioners at a time during the height of the COVID pandemic.
“We were being told by the world that church is not necessary,” says Hanson, a 39-year-old mother of three. “Our priest says, ‘No, that’s a lie. Our church is essential. Our salvation is essential. The sacraments are essential.’”
Andy Stevens, 52, came into the Church through the TLM, much to the surprise of his wife, Emma, who had been a practicing Catholic for many years. Andy was “very adamantly not going to become Catholic,” but was happy to help Emma with their children at Mass. It wasn’t until they attended a TLM that Andy began to think differently about the Church.
“He believed that you die and then there is nothing, and he never really spoke to me about becoming a Catholic,” says Emma, 48, who was pregnant with their seventh child at the time.
Andy noticed an intense focus among the worshippers, which he recognized as a “real presence of God” that he didn’t see anywhere else. After the birth of their 7th child, he joined the Church.
All 12 of the Stevens’ children prefer the TLM to the Novus Ordo.
“It’s a Mass of the ages,” says their eldest son, Ryan, 27. “I can feel the veil between heaven and earth palpably thinner.”
A native of Chicago, Adriel Gonzalez, 33, remembers attending the TLM as a child, which he did not particularly like. It was “very long, very boring,” and the people who went to the TLM were “very stiff and they could come off as judgmental” towards his family, he says.
Gonzalez, who also attended Mass in Spanish with his family, didn’t understand the differences among rites, since Chicago was a sort of “salad bowl, ethnically,” he says, and Mass was celebrated in many languages and forms.
He took a step back from faith for some time, he says, noting that he had a “respectability issue” with the Christianity he grew up with. He watched as some of his friends were either thoughtless in the way they practiced their faith, or were “on fire,” but lacked intentionality. When he did come back to the faith, it was through learning about the Church’s intellectual tradition.
He spent time in monasteries and Eastern Catholic parishes with the Divine Liturgy because there was “something so obviously ancient about it.” He decided to stay within the Roman rite with a preference for a reverent Novus Ordo.
When he moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, Gonzalez committed to his neighborhood parish, which had a strong contingent of people who loved tradition in general. The parish instituted a TLM in the fall of 2020, when they started having Mass indoors again after the pandemic.
“If I’m at a Latin Mass, I’m more likely to get a sense that this is a time-honored practice, something that has been honed over the millennia,” he says. “There is clearly a love affair going on here with the Lord that requires this much more elaborate song and dance.”
For Eric Matthews, the TLM feels a little like time travel.
“It could be medieval times, it could be the enlightenment period, it could be the early 1900s, and the experience is going to be so similar,” he says.
“I just feel like that’s that universal timeframe – not just the universal Church in 2021 – but the universal Church in almost any time period. We’re the only church that can claim that.”
What happens now?
The motu proprio caught Adriel Gonzalez’ attention. He sought clarity about whether his participation in the extraordinary form was, in fact, part of a divisive movement, or simply an expression of his faith.
If it was a movement, he wanted no part of it, he says.
“As far as I can tell, the Church considers the extraordinary form and the ordinary form equal and valid,” says Gonzalez. “Ideally, there should be no true difference between going to one or the other, outside of just preference. It shouldn’t constitute a completely different reality within Catholicism.”
With this understanding, Gonzalez says he resonated with some of the reasoning set forth in the motu proprio because it articulated that the celebration of the TLM was never intended to be a movement away from the Novus Ordo or Vatican II. Gonzalez also emphasized that the extraordinary form was never supposed to be a “superior” way of celebrating the Mass.
Gonzalez believes the Lord allowed the growth in the TLM “to help us to recover a love for liturgy, and to ask questions about what worship and liturgy looks like.” He would have preferred if what was good was kept and encouraged, and what was potentially dangerous “coaxed out and called out.”
Erin Hanson, of Mater Misericordiæ, agrees.
“If [Pope Francis] does believe there is division between Novus Ordo and traditional Catholics, I don’t think he did anything to try to fix that division,” she says.
Hanson would like to know who the bishops are that Pope Francis consulted in making this decision, sharing that she doesn’t feel that there is any of the transparency needed for such a major document. If there are divisions, she says, she would like the opportunity to work on them in a different way.
“This isn’t going to be any less divisive if he causes a possible schism,” Hanson says.
According to the motu proprio and the accompanying letter, the TLM is not to be celebrated in diocesan churches or in new churches constructed for the purpose of the TLM, nor should new groups be established by the bishops. Left out of their parish churches, some are worried their only option to attend Mass will be in a recreation center or hotel ballroom.
Eric Matthews hopes that everyone is able to experience the extraordinary form at least once in their life so they can know that this is not about division.
“I can’t imagine someone going to the Latin Mass and saying, ‘This is creating disunity,’” he says. “There’s nothing to be afraid of with the Latin Mass. You’re just going to be surrounding yourself with people that really take it to heart.”
Maureen McKinley was home sick when her husband Matt found out about the motu proprio. He had taken the kids to a neighborhood park, where he ran into some friends who also attend Mater Misericordiæ. They asked if he had heard the news.
“I felt disgust at a document that pretends to say so much while actually saying so little and disregards the Church’s very long and rich tradition of careful legal documents,” Matt McKinley says.
Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix stated that the TLM may continue at Mater Misericordiæ, as well as in chapels, oratories, mission churches, non-parochial churches, and at seven other parishes in the diocese. Participation in the TLM and all of the activities of the parish are so important to the McKinleys that they are willing to move to another state or city should further restrictions be implemented.
For now, their family’s routine continues the same as before.
At the end of their day, the McKinleys pray a family rosary in front of their home altar, which has a Bible at the center, and an icon of Christ and a statue of the Virgin Mary. They eat dinner together, milk the goat again, and take care of their evening animal chores. After night prayer, the kids head off to bed, blessing themselves with holy water from the fonts mounted on the wall before they enter their bedroom.
“The life of the Church springs from this Mass,” Maureen says. “That’s why we’re here—not because the Latin Mass is archaic, but that it’s actually just so alive.”
As we approach the month’s mind marker of Traditionis Custodes, and with the benefit of literally hundreds of articles produced, including my own reflection here at CWR within 48 hours of the promulgation of the […]
16 Comments
DeVille is generally on the right track, but Latins will not re-consider their ecclesiology.
Why not? If what he’s saying is true — that the Latin Church didn’t really have such an expansive understanding of the pope’s jurisdiction until very recently — why is it impossible for the prior understanding to make a return? Surely it would be a slow process, but I don’t think it’s reasonable to completely exclude it. Perhaps the reaction we’re seeing now is the progress of such a movement.
As an Orthodox Christian, “convert” from Roman Catholicism where I was for 20 years, I will say that while I do think this illustrates the problem with Roman over-centralization, on the other hand I am a little envious that you guys have an authority who can address a serious issue this quickly and efficiently. I sort of wish we had someone in Orthodoxy who could do the same thing about the Moscow-Constantinople split, or the Calendar nonsense.
I would like to thank Professor DeVille for his thoughtful commentary upon the recent Moto Proprio. Like him, I am Eastern Catholic, and have found great devotion and spiritual benefit from serving at the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (as well as SS. Basil the Great and Gregory Dialogos) for several decades now.
I therefore have little attachment to, or connexion with, either the Mass of Pope S. Paul VI, or that of Pope S. Pius V. Nonetheless, I have been saddened by the liturgical iconoclasm of the past half century in the Roman Church, and had hoped that the generosity of Pope Benedict XVI in promulgating ‘Summorum Pontificum’ could help overcome that iconoclasm.
I fear that His Holiness’ recent action serves to shut the door on that hope and in my face, and on the rights of many under canon law to worship in a legitimate rite of that Church. I also fear that His action will not serve His Holiness, either in this life, or in the next.
It is nauseating to have to admit that to be a Catholic in the “contemporary Catholic Church” means to be tyrannically ruled by apostate “progressive” clerics and their chanceries who hate Catholic tradition and memory and identity.
To be Catholic means to be outnumbered 10-to/1 by apostate “Catholic” University presidents and faculty.
It means having Bishops most of whom probably identify with John Kerry instead of John the Baptist.
But as to the Pontiff’s brutality in this action, what does one expect of the man elected Pontoff by the engineering of the sociopath sex abuser McCarrick, and the sociopath sex abuse coverup artist Cardinal Daneels?
When things such as this happen, I often wonder how we can keep from reacting to the last crisis in such a way that we set ourselves up for the next crisis. I also wonder how we can promote principles that are at least reasonably consistent across time and space. It gets tempting when a Pope makes a bad decision to weaken the papacy and then turn around and call for a stronger papacy when local bishops and priests misuse their authority, or even a stronger laity when all of the above misuse their authority.
In any case, this article is a useful contribution to the discussion.
I fully agree with Prof. DeVille on the unfortunate lack of appreciation for Eastern liturgical rites and traditions on the part of Latin Christians over the centuries. Vatican II’s solemn declaration that “the Churches of the East, as much as those of the West,” have the right and duty to rule themselves “in accordance with their own established traditions” (OE,5) was a welcome step towards correcting prior abuses. I am not sure, though, what to make of Prof. DeVille’s claim that “the post-1870 papacy is seriously at odds with the developed tradition up to that point.” This seems to suggest that what Vatican I taught about papal authority was a departure from tradition. I think a distinction needs to be made about the reality of universal papal authority and the exercise of that authority. The universal authority of the Roman See is hardly a novelty that emerges in 1870. Regarding the Apostolic See of Rome, St. Maximus the Confessor (c.580-662) stated: “This Apostolic See, which, from the Incarnate Word of God Himself, as well as from the holy councils (according to the sacred canons and definitions) has received and possesses the sovereignty, authority and power of binding and loosing over all the churches of God in the entire world, in and through all things” (Migne, PG 91:144). In its 1439 Decree for the Greeks, the Council of Florence defined that the Roman Pontiff is “the head of the whole Church, the father and teacher of all Christians; and that to him, in the person of Blessed Peter was given by our Lord Jesus Christ the full power of feeding, ruling, and governing the whole Church, as is also contained in the acts of the ecumenical councils and the sacred canons” (Denz.-H, 1307). Vatican I, in chapter 3 of Pastor Aeternus, cites this definition of the Ecumenical Council of Florence (Denz.-H, 3059). Vatican I’s teaching about the universal authority of the Roman Pontiff was drawing upon a developed tradition in spite of what Prof. DeVille suggests.
The papacy that emerged in the early 20th century–one that appoints every bishop in the world and reshapes the liturgy at will–is not something that can be found in the Fathers.
Pius IX refused to add Saint Joseph to the Roman Canon.
A century later, Paul VI promulgated a Mass where the Roman Canon itself is entirely optional.
Roman primacy should not equal papal absolutism. But here we are. And the elephant in the room will not be seen off with prooftexts from the Fathers.
Thank you, Dr. Fastiggi. I don’t really disagree with anything you’ve written, but I think the thrust of what you’re saying is that popes wield authority in matters of faith and morals, whereas Dr. DeVille is saying that the exercise of universal immediate jurisdiction is what’s not really traditional. Two different things.
The age of the televised and live-streamed personality-cult-Pontiffs, and the satellite-personality-cult of unaccountable Cardinals and Archbishops and Bishops, who operate with impunity by virtue of Billions of Dollars in their secret control, is repulsive and disgusting and infantile (as Adam Deville has indicated), and needs to be curtailed.
Dr Fastiggi, thanks for a well documented and reasoned response on the true nature of the papacy, and the difference between the office and its exercise.
DeVille is generally on the right track, but Latins will not re-consider their ecclesiology.
Reconsider your own ecclesiology.
Why not? If what he’s saying is true — that the Latin Church didn’t really have such an expansive understanding of the pope’s jurisdiction until very recently — why is it impossible for the prior understanding to make a return? Surely it would be a slow process, but I don’t think it’s reasonable to completely exclude it. Perhaps the reaction we’re seeing now is the progress of such a movement.
As an Orthodox Christian, “convert” from Roman Catholicism where I was for 20 years, I will say that while I do think this illustrates the problem with Roman over-centralization, on the other hand I am a little envious that you guys have an authority who can address a serious issue this quickly and efficiently. I sort of wish we had someone in Orthodoxy who could do the same thing about the Moscow-Constantinople split, or the Calendar nonsense.
The solution to the Moscow-Constnatinople split is not a superior authority but a humility that destroys clericalism.
I would like to thank Professor DeVille for his thoughtful commentary upon the recent Moto Proprio. Like him, I am Eastern Catholic, and have found great devotion and spiritual benefit from serving at the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (as well as SS. Basil the Great and Gregory Dialogos) for several decades now.
I therefore have little attachment to, or connexion with, either the Mass of Pope S. Paul VI, or that of Pope S. Pius V. Nonetheless, I have been saddened by the liturgical iconoclasm of the past half century in the Roman Church, and had hoped that the generosity of Pope Benedict XVI in promulgating ‘Summorum Pontificum’ could help overcome that iconoclasm.
I fear that His Holiness’ recent action serves to shut the door on that hope and in my face, and on the rights of many under canon law to worship in a legitimate rite of that Church. I also fear that His action will not serve His Holiness, either in this life, or in the next.
Many of us are not “ambivalent” about this papacy. We hate it, and rightly so.
It is nauseating to have to admit that to be a Catholic in the “contemporary Catholic Church” means to be tyrannically ruled by apostate “progressive” clerics and their chanceries who hate Catholic tradition and memory and identity.
To be Catholic means to be outnumbered 10-to/1 by apostate “Catholic” University presidents and faculty.
It means having Bishops most of whom probably identify with John Kerry instead of John the Baptist.
But as to the Pontiff’s brutality in this action, what does one expect of the man elected Pontoff by the engineering of the sociopath sex abuser McCarrick, and the sociopath sex abuse coverup artist Cardinal Daneels?
You lost me at “askesis and apophaticism, involving massive and massively kenotic self-denial on all our parts.” Maybe the vernacular isn’t all bad.
When things such as this happen, I often wonder how we can keep from reacting to the last crisis in such a way that we set ourselves up for the next crisis. I also wonder how we can promote principles that are at least reasonably consistent across time and space. It gets tempting when a Pope makes a bad decision to weaken the papacy and then turn around and call for a stronger papacy when local bishops and priests misuse their authority, or even a stronger laity when all of the above misuse their authority.
In any case, this article is a useful contribution to the discussion.
I fully agree with Prof. DeVille on the unfortunate lack of appreciation for Eastern liturgical rites and traditions on the part of Latin Christians over the centuries. Vatican II’s solemn declaration that “the Churches of the East, as much as those of the West,” have the right and duty to rule themselves “in accordance with their own established traditions” (OE,5) was a welcome step towards correcting prior abuses. I am not sure, though, what to make of Prof. DeVille’s claim that “the post-1870 papacy is seriously at odds with the developed tradition up to that point.” This seems to suggest that what Vatican I taught about papal authority was a departure from tradition. I think a distinction needs to be made about the reality of universal papal authority and the exercise of that authority. The universal authority of the Roman See is hardly a novelty that emerges in 1870. Regarding the Apostolic See of Rome, St. Maximus the Confessor (c.580-662) stated: “This Apostolic See, which, from the Incarnate Word of God Himself, as well as from the holy councils (according to the sacred canons and definitions) has received and possesses the sovereignty, authority and power of binding and loosing over all the churches of God in the entire world, in and through all things” (Migne, PG 91:144). In its 1439 Decree for the Greeks, the Council of Florence defined that the Roman Pontiff is “the head of the whole Church, the father and teacher of all Christians; and that to him, in the person of Blessed Peter was given by our Lord Jesus Christ the full power of feeding, ruling, and governing the whole Church, as is also contained in the acts of the ecumenical councils and the sacred canons” (Denz.-H, 1307). Vatican I, in chapter 3 of Pastor Aeternus, cites this definition of the Ecumenical Council of Florence (Denz.-H, 3059). Vatican I’s teaching about the universal authority of the Roman Pontiff was drawing upon a developed tradition in spite of what Prof. DeVille suggests.
The papacy that emerged in the early 20th century–one that appoints every bishop in the world and reshapes the liturgy at will–is not something that can be found in the Fathers.
Pius IX refused to add Saint Joseph to the Roman Canon.
A century later, Paul VI promulgated a Mass where the Roman Canon itself is entirely optional.
Roman primacy should not equal papal absolutism. But here we are. And the elephant in the room will not be seen off with prooftexts from the Fathers.
Thank you, Dr. Fastiggi. I don’t really disagree with anything you’ve written, but I think the thrust of what you’re saying is that popes wield authority in matters of faith and morals, whereas Dr. DeVille is saying that the exercise of universal immediate jurisdiction is what’s not really traditional. Two different things.
Maybe I’m wrong.
The age of the televised and live-streamed personality-cult-Pontiffs, and the satellite-personality-cult of unaccountable Cardinals and Archbishops and Bishops, who operate with impunity by virtue of Billions of Dollars in their secret control, is repulsive and disgusting and infantile (as Adam Deville has indicated), and needs to be curtailed.
Dr Fastiggi, thanks for a well documented and reasoned response on the true nature of the papacy, and the difference between the office and its exercise.
Thank you for your gracious comment, Father. God bless you.