A sacramentary is seen on the altar during a traditional Tridentine Mass July 18, 2021, at St. Josaphat Church in the Queens borough of New York City. (CNS photo/Gregory A. Shemitz)
Vatican City, Jul 3, 2025 / 09:15 am (CNA).
A Vatican spokesman has played down the significance of recently leaked Vatican documents that appear to cast doubt on Pope Francis’ rationale for restricting the Latin Mass, calling the documents “partial and incomplete.”
The documents appear to show that bishops had a more favorable outlook on the Traditional Latin Mass than Pope Francis suggested when he issued controversial restrictions on its celebration in 2021.
Vatican journalist Diane Montagna published two excerpts from an internal Vatican report on the global consultation of bishops in a Substack newsletter July 1. The publication of the texts has sparked renewed controversy over Francis’ decision to restrict the celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass at a time when some liturgical traditionalists are voicing hopes that Pope Leo will reverse or moderate his predecessor’s action.
Matteo Bruni, director of the Holy See Press Office, said July 3 the leaked information “presumably concerns part of one of the documents on which the decision [to restrict the Latin Mass] is based.”
Answering a question from CNA during a press conference on another topic, Bruni called published reports “a very partial and incomplete reconstruction of the decision-making process.” At the same time, he refused to confirm the documents’ authenticity.
The spokesman added that “other documentation, other reports, also the result of further consultations” were also taken into consideration with regard to restrictions on the Latin Mass.
An official at the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, the department responsible for the application of Traditionis Custodes, Pope Francis’ July 2021 decree restricting the Mass, told CNA on July 3 that the dicastery “has nothing further to add” to Bruni’s response.
The leaked texts, which summarize consultation results and selected quotations from bishops, have been hailed by critics of Traditionis Custodes as evidence that Pope Francis was misleading when stating his reasons for placing strict restrictions on the celebration of the Latin Mass.
Francis’ decree revoked the permissions granted by Pope Benedict XVI in his 2007 decree Summorum Pontificum.
“The claim that a majority of bishops around the world wanted restrictions on the ancient Mass [Traditional Latin Mass] was always dubious, but this document shows for all to see that it is completely false,” Joseph Shaw, president of the Latin Mass federation Una Voce International, wrote in a newsletter on July 2.
Shaw said the leaked documents show “only the views of the minority of bishops who really disliked the TLM were being acted upon. The majority view was ignored.”
Traditionis Custodes placed significant restrictions on the celebration of the Mass according to missals from before the liturgical reforms of the Second Vatican Council. In the decree, Pope Francis said he had taken into consideration “the wishes expressed by the episcopate” and “the opinion of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.”
Pope Francis explained in a letter accompanying the decree that in 2020 he had asked the now-Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith to carry out a survey of bishops around the world about the results of the implementation of the 2007 norms on the celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass.
“The responses reveal a situation that preoccupies and saddens me, and persuades me of the need to intervene,” Francis wrote in the letter. He added that the intention of his predecessors, to foster unity among Catholics with diverse liturgical sensibilities, “has often been seriously disregarded” and the opportunity “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.”
According to one of the leaked documents, a five-page “overall assessment” that according to Montagna was part of a never-published report more than 200 pages long on the results of the 2020 questionnaire, the consultation found “the majority of bishops who responded … and who have generously and intelligently implemented the MP [motu proprio] Summorum Pontificum, ultimately express satisfaction with it.” But “some bishops state that the MP Summorum Pontificum has failed in its aim of fostering reconciliation and therefore request its suppression.”
The leaked assessment said some bishops stated they would prefer to return to the pre-2007 rules for the Traditional Latin Mass, when its celebration required permission from the local bishop, “in order to have greater control and management of the situation.”
“However,” the text continued, “the majority of bishops who responded to the questionnaire state that making legislative changes to the MP Summorum Pontificum would cause more harm than good.”
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Pallbearers carry the wooden coffin of Pope Francis, marked with a cross, into St. Peter’s Square for the funeral Mass on April 26, 2025. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA
Vatican City, Apr 26, 2025 / 05:03 am (CNA).
More than 200,000 people filled St. Peter’s Square for the funeral of Pope Francis on Saturday as the world said goodbye to the first Latin American pope who led the Catholic Church for the past 12 years.
Under the bright Roman sun and amid crowds extending down the Via della Conciliazione, the funeral Mass unfolded within the great colonnade of St. Peter’s Basilica. Heads of state, religious leaders, and pilgrims from across the globe gathered for the historic farewell.
An aerial view of St. Peter’s Square filled with thousands of mourners, clergy, and dignitaries gathered for Pope Francis’s funeral Mass under clear blue skies in Vatican City on April 26, 2025.`. Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the dean of the College of Cardinals, presided over the Mass, delivering a homily that paid tribute to Francis’ missionary vision, human warmth, spontaneity, witness to mercy, and “charisma of welcome and listening.”
“Evangelization was the guiding principle of his pontificate,” Re said.
Pope Francis “often used the image of the Church as a ‘field hospital’ after a battle in which many were wounded; a Church determined to take care of the problems of people and the great anxieties that tear the contemporary world apart; a Church capable of bending down to every person, regardless of their beliefs or condition, and healing their wounds.”
As bells tolled solemnly, the funeral rite began with the intonation of the entrance antiphon: “Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him.”
The late pope’s closed plain wooden coffin lay in front of the altar throughout the Mass.
A view of the coffin of Pope Francis resting before the altar at the funeral Mass on St. Peter’s Square, April 26, 2025. Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA
“In this majestic Saint Peter’s Square, where Pope Francis celebrated the Eucharist so many times and presided over great gatherings over the past twelve years, we are gathered with sad hearts in prayer around his mortal remains,” Re said.
“With our prayers, we now entrust the soul of our beloved Pontiff to God, that he may grant him eternal happiness in the bright and glorious gaze of his immense love,” he added.
View of St. Peter’s Basilica during the Funeral Mass of Pope Francis on April 26, 2025. Peter Gagnon / EWTN
Among the more than 50 heads of state present were U.S. President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, alongside former President Joe Biden. Also in attendance were Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Argentine President Javier Milei, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, French President Emmanuel Macron, and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva joined the throng of international dignitaries along with representatives of religious traditions from around the world.
Royal families also paid their respects, with Prince William representing King Charles III and Spanish King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia seated near the altar.
Pilgrims arrived before sunrise to claim their spots in St. Peter’s Square for the Mass with the first in line camping out the night before.
The funeral followed the Ordo Exsequiarum Romani Pontificis, the official liturgical order for papal funerals, which was updated at Pope Francis’ own request in 2024. Scripture readings included Acts 10:34-43, Philippians 3:20–4:1, Psalm 22, and the Gospel of John 21:15-19 — a passage in which the risen Christ tells Peter: “Feed my sheep.”
More than 200 cardinals and 750 bishops and priests concelebrated the funeral Mass. More than 4,000 journalists representing 1,800 media outlets reported on the event. All told, the Holy See said more than 250,000 mourners attended.
In his homily, Cardinal Re reflected on key moments in Pope Francis’ pontificate from his risk-defying trip to Iraq to visit Christians communities persecuted by the Islamic State to his Mass on the border between Mexico and the United States during his journey to Mexico.
“Faced with the raging wars of recent years, with their inhuman horrors and countless deaths and destruction, Pope Francis incessantly raised his voice imploring peace and calling for reason and honest negotiation to find possible solutions,” the cardinal said, causing the crowd to erupt in spontaneous applause.
Pope Francis’ coffin lies in St. Peter’s Square during the papal funeral Mass on Saturday, April 26, 2025. Credit: EWTN News
“Pope Francis always placed the Gospel of mercy at the center, repeatedly emphasizing that God never tires of forgiving us. He forgives, whatever the situation might be of the person who asks for forgiveness and returns to the right path,” Re reflected. “Mercy and the joy of the Gospel are two key words for Pope Francis.”
The cardinal presided over the final commendation and farewell for Pope Francis, praying: “Dear brothers and sisters, let us commend to God’s tender mercy the soul of Pope Francis, bishop of the Catholic Church, who confirmed his brothers and sisters in the faith of the resurrection.”
“Let us pray to God our Father through Jesus Christ and in the Holy Spirit; may he deliver him from death, welcome him to eternal peace and raise up him on the last day,” he said.
After the crowd chanted the Litany of Saints in Latin, Cardinal Baldassare Reina, vicar general of the Diocese of Rome, offered a final prayer: “O God, faithful rewarder of souls, grant that your departed servant and our bishop, Pope Francis, whom you made successor of Peter and shepherd of your Church, may happily enjoy forever in your presence in heaven the mysteries of your grace and compassion, which he faithfully ministered on earth.”
A poignant moment followed as Eastern Catholic patriarchs, major archbishops, and metropolitans from the “sui iuris” Churches approached the coffin while a choir chanted a Greek prayer from the Byzantine Funeral Office.
Re blessed the coffin with holy water and incense as the choir sang in Latin: “I know that my Redeemer lives: on the last day I shall rise again.”
At the end of the Mass, the traditional antiphon “In Paradisum” was sung in Latin, asking for the angels to guide the pope’s soul to heaven.
“May the angels lead you into paradise; may the martyrs come and welcome you and take you to the holy city, the new and eternal Jerusalem. May choirs of angels welcome you and with Lazarus, who is poor no longer, may you have eternal rest.”
In keeping with his wishes, Pope Francis will not be buried in the Vatican grottoes alongside his predecessors. Instead, his body will be taken in procession through the streets of Rome in a vehicle to the Basilica of St. Mary Major, a church he visited over 100 times in his lifetime to pray before an icon of the Virgin Mary, “Salus Populi Romani,” particularly before and after his papal journeys.
Pope Francis’ wooden coffin is transported on the popemobile through the streets of Rome as crowds of faithful line the procession route from St. Peter’s Basilica to the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, April 26, 2025. Credit: Daniel Ibáñez/CNA
In Rome’s most important Marian basilica, Pope Francis will be laid to rest in a simple tomb marked with a single word: Franciscus.
Remembering Pope Francis
Jorge Mario Bergoglio was born on Dec. 17, 1936, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and entered the Society of Jesus at age 21. Following his ordination in 1969, he served as a Jesuit provincial, seminary rector, and professor before St. John Paul II appointed him auxiliary bishop of Buenos Aires in 1992. He became archbishop of the Argentine capital in 1998 and was created cardinal in 2001.
The surprise election of Cardinal Bergoglio on March 13, 2013, at age 76 marked several historic firsts: He became the first Jesuit pope, the first from the Americas, and the first to choose the name Francis, inspired by St. Francis of Assisi’s devotion to poverty, peace, and creation.
His 12-year pontificate was characterized by a focus on mercy, care for creation, and attention to what he called the “peripheries” of both the Church and society. He made 47 apostolic journeys outside Italy, though he never visited his native Argentina.
During his tenure, Pope Francis canonized 942 saints — more than any other pope in history — including his predecessors John XXIII, Paul VI, and John Paul II. He published four encyclicals and seven apostolic exhortations while promulgating 75 motu proprio documents.
Throughout his papacy, Francis significantly reshaped the College of Cardinals through 10 consistories, creating 163 new cardinals. His appointments reflected his vision of a global Church, elevating prelates from the peripheries and creating cardinals in places that had never before had one, including Mongolia and South Sudan.
Health challenges marked the pope’s final years. He underwent surgery in July 2021 and in June 2023. In November 2023, he suffered from pulmonary inflammation, and in February 2025, he was hospitalized at Rome’s Gemelli Hospital for bronchitis and a respiratory infection.
His papacy faced unprecedented challenges, including the global COVID-19 pandemic, during which he offered historic moments of prayer for humanity, notably the extraordinary urbi et orbi blessing in an empty St. Peter’s Square in March 2020. He also repeatedly called for peace amid conflicts in Ukraine and the Holy Land.
Francis convoked four synods, including the Synod on Synodality, whose second session concluded in October 2024. He implemented significant reforms of the Roman Curia and took several steps to address the clergy abuse crisis, including the 2019 motu proprio Vos Estis Lux Mundi.
Pope Francis’ funeral marks the first day in the Catholic Church’s traditional nine-day mourning period that will include nine days of requiem Masses to be offered for the repose of his soul.
“Pope Francis used to conclude his speeches and meetings by saying, ‘Do not forget to pray for me,’ Re recalled at the end of his homily.
“Dear Pope Francis, we now ask you to pray for us. May you bless the Church, bless Rome, and bless the whole world from heaven as you did last Sunday from the balcony of this Basilica in a final embrace with all the people of God, but also embrace humanity that seeks the truth with a sincere heart and holds high the torch of hope.”
Vatican City, Dec 11, 2019 / 12:55 pm (CNA).- Pope Francis said Wednesday that persecution has always been a part of the Church’s life, and that the witness of martyrdom is a blessing for all Christians.
Ofcourse the Franciscan-Vatican-spokepeople would like to find a place to hide to keep quiet. That’s exactly what happens when Truth is revealed to previously have been made a lie. Liars will squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp, where it remains perpetually dark. God have mercy.
The trads are making a full-court press to try to coerce Pope Leo into giving them back their TLM. I think they should just go to the SSPX. If they won’t accept the reformed liturgy, we don’t need nor want them. There have to be standards and limits. The TLM definitely is related to anti-Vatican 2 sentiment. That’s what motivated Lefebvre. If he hadn’t seceded from the Church to continue celebrating the TLM, we wouldn’t be having this conversation; the TLM wouldn’t exist anywhere. The TLM is now inherently separatist and isolationist, and it foments an anti-Vatican 2 mindset.
So much falsehood in Donald’s statements. I know a HUGE number of people, many associated with the John Paul II Institutes and MANY other places, that accept and study the documents of Vatican II yet also love the Latin Mass. Some people think there are only two groups – the post Vatican II people who think an entirely new Church came into being in the 1960s, or those who wish us to be frozen in the 16th century. There are SO MANY theologians, living and dead, such as John Paul II, Benedict XVI, David Schindler, Tracey Roland, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Larry Chapp, and scores and scores more who accept Vatican II, development of doctrine, understand the hermeneutic of continuity, etc. They understand that as Aquinas had to deal with Aristotle, so the current Church had to deal with Heidegger etc. We have NO INTEREST AT ALL in schism. People really embarrass themselves by not acknowledging these theologians, saints, popes, etc. As for “we don’t want them”, who are you to kick people out of the Church? Do you feel the same way about devotees of OTHER older rites, such as the Maronite or Dominican (I went to one of their masses a few weeks ago), or newer but different ones like the Anglican Ordinariate? Who gets to decide that the Mass attended by everyone who went to Vatican II, every day, and all the great saints and theologians throughout history, should now be thrown into the dustbin of history? What foments division are those who throw hatred at the Mass of the Ages. There is no reason for it; there are many forms of the Roman Rite and this hatred is obscene.
As for me, I grew up in the Latin Mass till 17. I was so happy to see it go and not have to depend on my Missal for translation despite having a year of church Latin. I like watching the priest’s face to know the extent of his personal passion for Christ especially at the moment after communion when he is cleaning the fragments of Host. Is it a labor of love or a nuisance? These nuances bleed through the priest’s countenance.
I like taking non-Catholics to Mass to dispel their crazy notions of Catholicism. Can’t do it successfully if the Mass is in Latin.
“know the extent of his personal passion for Christ especially at the moment after communion when he is cleaning the fragments of Host”
This is an astounding absurd take. What if that priest just received bad news day before-that a family member was seriously ill or dying? What if he’s in pain from some chronic ailment?
We shouldn’t be conducting the Mass to provide for the rash judgments of the Rebozos in the pews.
Are you aware that Scott Hahn, one of the greatest living lay evangelists and a Protestant convert himself, attends the Traditional Latin Mass? I see him there almost every week (unless I am attending a Byzantine Divine Liturgy, which I do from time to time). I also grew up with the TLM, and everything you have said about it here is malarkey.
So, I guess what Pope Benedict XVI wrote in his letter accompanying the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum: “What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.” means nothing to you? 🤦♂️
How can a Mass that is more reverent, possibly be considered divisive?
“What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.” Certainly does ring True.
Not all of a sudden entirely forbidden, but step by step gradually and entirely phased out because it has been supplanted by a reformed version of the Mass by order of Vatican II and decree of Pope Paul VI.
There is a schism which is vertical: the refusal of union with the Holy Father. Most people attached to the TLM do not do this. Some do.
There is also a schism which is horizontal: the refusal of union with others who are united with the Holy Father. Those who refuse union with those attached to the TLM do this.
This a bizarre comment. If you were in Tim Kaine’s Virginia parish, where the staunchly pro-abortion, pro-LGBTQ+ “catholic” politician received a standing ovation from parishioners, would you even WANT to be in “horizontal communion” with all the people around you? I don’t have any doubt that the statistical studies are accurate: 70% of those who attend the Novus Ordo do not even believe in the Real Presence in the Eucharist. I can assure you that would NOT be the result of any polling in a TLM parish.
Vatican Press Office secretary Bruni speaks for Cdl Arthur Roche, prefect Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. That assures it was run by the Cardinal, who has full knowledge of Traditionis Custodes because it was issued from his office likely written at least in part perhaps with assistance from Cdl Victor Fernandez prefect DDF. A typical snow job to protect themselves and the originator Pope Francis.
Can we reasonably presume this brief write off was not brought to Pope Leo’s attention? He’s the one who has ultimate say on how to deal with, not simply the authenticity of Diane Montagna’s collage of excerpts – rather with the crux of the matter. How does Pope Leo wish to address this in context of Cdl Burke’s request? Sadly, the entire snow job write off scenario apparently answers the question.
meiron, you said it best so all I can do is repeat what you’ve written, “Ofcourse the Franciscan-Vatican-spokepeople would like to find a place to hide to keep quiet. That’s exactly what happens when Truth is revealed to previously have been made a lie. Liars will squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp, where it remains perpetually dark. God have mercy.”
In fairness to Pope Leo perhaps he had no choice, assuming he was consulted except to agree to the Press Office secretary’s dismissive explanation. He may on his own time frame an address to the matter more favorably toward the TLM. An indication may be the recent announcement that the Rupnik case judges have been selected.
If that were the case, why didn’t Hagen-Leo just tell his Vatican flacks to stand down and be silent? Instead, it is Hagen-Leo who is silent while his flacks deploy clouds of Bergoglian blather to cover their posteriors as they “squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp.”
Indeed, when a pope, or one who purports to be, is discovered in the act of dissembling, it is not merely a personal failing, or a private stumble in the moral dark. No, it is a cataclysm. I fear for the fledgling soul, barely past the threshold of belief, such a revelation is often a crushing blow. How can one trust in the divine, when its earthly shepherd proves himself a charlatan? The tender shoots of nascent faith, so carefully nurtured, are not merely bruised; they are torn from the very soil of conviction. The young believer, once perhaps drawn by the promise of steadfastness and truth, is left with a gaping wound where his faith once resided, a wound that festers with cynicism and doubt.
Nor are the faithful veterans immune, those seasoned followers who have weathered many a storm of doubt and celebrated countless triumphs of the spirit. For them, the lie from a leader is not a sudden, fatal strike, but rather a slow, insidious erosion. It is akin to a crack appearing in the very foundation of a grand cathedral they have long revered. Each falsehood, each twisting of the truth, however small, drips like acid upon the stone of their enduring faith, weakening its integrity, making them question the very edifice they have spent decades defending. The bedrock of their conviction, once seemingly unshakeable, begins to crumble, and with it, the quiet confidence that once sustained them. For if the very stewards of truth cannot be trusted, then what truth remains? It is a question that gnaws at the soul, a bitter fruit born of betrayal.
So let it be known, and let it be stated with the utmost clarity: the lie, from the mouth of a pope, is not a minor transgression. It is a betrayal of the highest order, an act that not only defiles the speaker but, far more grievously, wounds the very heart of the faithful, both old and new. It is a deed that, far from building the Kingdom, actively dismantles it, brick by painstaking brick.
Alas , we find that a pope is merely a man after all. It’s like pulling back the curtain and finding the true wizard of Oz. Is it relief or disappointment? Are we so uncomfortable because he looks too much like us?
“Matteo Bruni…said…the leaked information ‘presumably concerns part of one of the documents on which the decision [to restrict the Latin Mass] is based.’”
So we are led to believe that there were other documents—presumably with more compelling reasons to restrict the Latin Mass—which we are not privy to. Sure! So where are these other documents!?
Oh what a tangled web we weave– when first we begin to deceive!!
The irony of the whole matter is that the very people who proclaim the Church to be a listening, “synodal” Church, reaching out to those on the “margins,” now show themselves to be malevolent totalitarians demanding conformity. There. I fixed it for you.
Oh what a tangled weave they will continue to weave; as we speak, The True Church Of Jesus The Christ is illuminating the darkness of the counterfeit magisterium, which cannot overcome The Way, The Truth, and The Light (Life) of Perfect Divine Eternal Love Incarnate, Our Savior, Jesus The Christ, although it will continue to do some serious damage , if this counterfeit magisterium is not charitably anathema for The Salvation of Souls. Division is not of The Holy Ghost, nor is the counterfeit magisterium of The Holy Ghost, as it serves to accommodate those who deny The Sanctity and Dignity of the marital act within The Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, and The Sanctity and Dignity of human life from the moment of conception to natural death. Without the use of The Charitable Anathema, Instituted by Christ for The Salvation of Souls, this counterfeit magisterium will continue to deny The Unity Of The Holy Ghost, and is thus anti Filioque and anti Pope.
“You cannot be My Disciples if you do not Abide In My Word.” – The Charitable Anathema of Jesus The Christ.
Is it possible to have a copy of the Holy Mass in latin. I sudied in school where we daly Mass and must answer in latin. Now I have forgoten many parts of them and I will appreciate very much to get a copy. Regards.
Mateo Bruni is speaking falsely, whatever his “intentions” might be.
Dianne Montagna has disclosed the conclusion of the majority of Bishops: Summorum Pontificicum was ‘a success,’ and waging a new-liturgy-war against the Vetus Ordo “would cause more harm than good.”
The 14 pages includes the summary (“Overall Assessment”)of the survey report, similar to an executive summary, along with a collection of quotations from tne survey respondents. (Not just 14 random pages). The Vatican has not released the full report, but the Overall Assessment should contain all of the key points. If the full report says something different, that would be unusual, but the ball is in the Vatican’s court. They can release the full report whenever they want to..
You can read the Overall Assessment on Diane Montagna’s Substack, in the links at the bottom of her first article (there’s a followup). I just searched for “Diane Montagna Substack” and found it quickly. I always like to read these documents, when they are available, rather than relying on bits and pieces in articles and posts.
As in the Paul Newman movie “Cool Hand Luke” (1967): “What we have here is a failure to communicate!”
Back in the 1960s and 1970s, liturgical innovations poisoned the well on the legitimate reform of THE Liturgy. Clown masses and masses of clowns. In the eyes of many and in many locales, the Novus Ordo today still reminds of such early experimentation.
Three questions:
FIRST, is the symmetrical comparison no longer between TLM and Novus Ordo, but rather between the Altar and now the synodal Roundtable? Why are we even reminded that another symmetrical comparison is not between the Bible and the Qur’an, but between the incarnate Jesus Christ (“the Word made flesh”) and the Qur’an (“the word made Book”)?
SECOND, might another symmetrical comparison be between early mismanagement of the liturgical reform (1963) and more recent mismanagement of the sexual abuse crisis? What did Sacrosanctum Concilium actually say about liturgical reform? How about this:
n. 40 (1) “The competent territorial ecclesiastical authority mentioned in Art. 22, 2, must, in this matter, carefully and prudently consider which elements from the traditions and culture of individual peoples might appropriately be admitted into divine worship. Adaptations which are judged to be useful or necessary should then be submitted to the Apostolic See, by whose consent they may be introduced [!].” https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19631204_sacrosanctum-concilium_en.html Can’t remember much about submittals and consents!
THIRD, today, how for the Church to leaven itself ever more as communio and the “ecclesial assembly” around and then beyond the Altar? Instead of as a Roundtable too much replacing Altar—the sacramental Real Presence (CCC 1374)?
SUMMARY: Councils and Synods are what the Church DOES, not what the Church IS.
Perhaps Pope Francis felt a need or saw a need to emphasize and promote a human virtue of getting along with others -as that seemed to him and certain others; however it would still make no sense to enjoin human virtues or any particular human virtue in a synodalism?
According to Francisca Javiera del Valle in her tome About the Holy Spirit, Christ on the Cross was mediating with the Father to win the Holy Spirit for us, at some moment purely as man when he was moved to cry out about his abandonment. The Father gave answer and it was only then that Christ would admit -surrender,- “It is consummated”, the work upon the Sacrifice.
Well now, just what are some of these priests talking about, sometimes!
In Bible study I was told that Christ was speaking the first verses of Psalm 22. You need to read the entire psalm to see how it applies to Christ’s Crucifixion. I was also told that the Last Supper was an incomplete Passover Seder. Four cups of wine are consumed during the Passover Seder. The third cup, the Cup of Blessing, was used when the Institution of the Eucharist was enacted. The Last Supper then ended before Christ drank the fourth cup. The common wine vinegar that Christ was given on a sponge when He said “I thirst” was the fourth cup. I’ve heard it called the Cup Of Consummation. The Last Supper and Christ’s Passion and Death were one continuous event. This was Christ’s hour.
That’s in keeping with Scott Hahn’s take on the Passover.
But Jesus gave us the New Covenant of the One Cup of His Blood.
It’s possible to suffer through many “cups” more than “4” or “5” and still be in the Communion. Also to suffer a mere “2 cups” yet have the fullness of Communion. Or suffer an inexplicable sudden death with no “cup”.
Many “cups” can vie but Christ focused us on the One.
GregB, a guy could have 40, 50 even 80 cups of suffering and it would account for nothing beyond the One Cup of Salvation shared in Our Lord Jesus Christ.
I believe we should be helping Hahn get away from the Spectral Tru_k-Lo_d of Cups that is stalking him around everywhere. At CWR I have made some entries about that already. See my comments in the first 2 links below; in particular the first one on St. Jerome, Elias Galy October 2, 2024 at 3:10 pm.
In another place in CWR I mentioned that following on the Christ Event, Judaism tried adapting experiences from during that time, into its own ways, to try to overtake it. This would be to maintain interest for the Jews but also “outshine” and diminish and refute the Christ Event and secure “Jewish supremacy”.
See my comment in the third link on Valtorta, Elias Galy September 23, 2021 at 6:36 am, first two paragraphs.
Protestants are reacting to Hahn’s “4 cups” in their own instincts, see the third link Hahn’s Hersey: The Four Cups? at THIRD MILL . ORG. In this example of objections they accuse Hahn of heresy over necessity of Eucharist, which of course is quite wrong; however they raise a number of other reasonable points. Among the points coming up is a reference to evidence that “four cups” only appeared in Passover tradition from the 2nd Century A.D.
I was an altar boy in the 1940’s. We said the Confiteor (I Confess) in Latin at the start of Mass. We knew the words in English.
It was a good start (I Confess) at the start of Mass.
The words were changed in Vatican 11 and the Mass then encountered
many changes (not for the better). Some charlatans and others raised
havoc with the Mass.
It is time (2025) for rebirth of the original Mass.
Look, when you have people like Peter Kwasniewski publishing books and articles and making speeches that the novus ordo Mass needs to be abolished and the church return to celebrating only the TLM (as it was before 1955, no less), then trad world has a big problem with the modern church. That’s the root of their love of the TLM and their hatred of the novus ordo and of Pope Francis: they don’t like modernity and want to go back in time.
Mr. Wright if an individual expresses those views they speak for themselves. They do not speak for everyone who attends the TLM. Nor for someone like me who visits it.
Seems, Mr. Wright, that you have insight into the inner workings and motivations of just about everyone who thinks differently than you. Question: Do you spend much time examining your own mind and heart?
These days many aee inclined to weigh the merits of the men who have most recently occupied the Chair of Peter. I have a challenge to all of us. Think of the recent Popes in terms of which ones would have made a good husband to a wife and a good father to his children. I would assert that only a man who would have made a good husband and father is worthy to be Pope (Abba, Father). As a corollary to this challenge, think of whichcrecent Popes you would have liked to have had as YOUR biological father. I’d suggest applying the same standard to your bishop and your pastor.
Ofcourse the Franciscan-Vatican-spokepeople would like to find a place to hide to keep quiet. That’s exactly what happens when Truth is revealed to previously have been made a lie. Liars will squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp, where it remains perpetually dark. God have mercy.
You nailed it.
I’ll add this only makes Bergoglio look worse. If that’s possible.
The trads are making a full-court press to try to coerce Pope Leo into giving them back their TLM. I think they should just go to the SSPX. If they won’t accept the reformed liturgy, we don’t need nor want them. There have to be standards and limits. The TLM definitely is related to anti-Vatican 2 sentiment. That’s what motivated Lefebvre. If he hadn’t seceded from the Church to continue celebrating the TLM, we wouldn’t be having this conversation; the TLM wouldn’t exist anywhere. The TLM is now inherently separatist and isolationist, and it foments an anti-Vatican 2 mindset.
So much falsehood in Donald’s statements. I know a HUGE number of people, many associated with the John Paul II Institutes and MANY other places, that accept and study the documents of Vatican II yet also love the Latin Mass. Some people think there are only two groups – the post Vatican II people who think an entirely new Church came into being in the 1960s, or those who wish us to be frozen in the 16th century. There are SO MANY theologians, living and dead, such as John Paul II, Benedict XVI, David Schindler, Tracey Roland, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Larry Chapp, and scores and scores more who accept Vatican II, development of doctrine, understand the hermeneutic of continuity, etc. They understand that as Aquinas had to deal with Aristotle, so the current Church had to deal with Heidegger etc. We have NO INTEREST AT ALL in schism. People really embarrass themselves by not acknowledging these theologians, saints, popes, etc. As for “we don’t want them”, who are you to kick people out of the Church? Do you feel the same way about devotees of OTHER older rites, such as the Maronite or Dominican (I went to one of their masses a few weeks ago), or newer but different ones like the Anglican Ordinariate? Who gets to decide that the Mass attended by everyone who went to Vatican II, every day, and all the great saints and theologians throughout history, should now be thrown into the dustbin of history? What foments division are those who throw hatred at the Mass of the Ages. There is no reason for it; there are many forms of the Roman Rite and this hatred is obscene.
“There have to be standards and limits.” You attend the Novus Ordo and can actually say this? That is hilarious.
His standards and limits.
As for me, I grew up in the Latin Mass till 17. I was so happy to see it go and not have to depend on my Missal for translation despite having a year of church Latin. I like watching the priest’s face to know the extent of his personal passion for Christ especially at the moment after communion when he is cleaning the fragments of Host. Is it a labor of love or a nuisance? These nuances bleed through the priest’s countenance.
I like taking non-Catholics to Mass to dispel their crazy notions of Catholicism. Can’t do it successfully if the Mass is in Latin.
“I like watching the priest’s face”
It’s not about you.
“know the extent of his personal passion for Christ especially at the moment after communion when he is cleaning the fragments of Host”
This is an astounding absurd take. What if that priest just received bad news day before-that a family member was seriously ill or dying? What if he’s in pain from some chronic ailment?
We shouldn’t be conducting the Mass to provide for the rash judgments of the Rebozos in the pews.
Are you aware that Scott Hahn, one of the greatest living lay evangelists and a Protestant convert himself, attends the Traditional Latin Mass? I see him there almost every week (unless I am attending a Byzantine Divine Liturgy, which I do from time to time). I also grew up with the TLM, and everything you have said about it here is malarkey.
Donald: A friend of mine once had a favored expression. It went like this: “Hate destroys the hater.”
“If they won’t accept the reformed liturgy, we don’t need nor want them.”
Who are you trying to say is “we?” Sounds like Donald thinks he is the arbitrator of the Mass.
So, I guess what Pope Benedict XVI wrote in his letter accompanying the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum: “What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.” means nothing to you? 🤦♂️
Your point of view on those who worship using the TLM under Summorum Pontificum separates yourself from the judgement of the Synod of Bishops.
How can a Mass that is more reverent, possibly be considered divisive?
“What earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful.” Certainly does ring True.
Not all of a sudden entirely forbidden, but step by step gradually and entirely phased out because it has been supplanted by a reformed version of the Mass by order of Vatican II and decree of Pope Paul VI.
Vatican II and Pope Paul ordered no such thing.
There is a schism which is vertical: the refusal of union with the Holy Father. Most people attached to the TLM do not do this. Some do.
There is also a schism which is horizontal: the refusal of union with others who are united with the Holy Father. Those who refuse union with those attached to the TLM do this.
This a bizarre comment. If you were in Tim Kaine’s Virginia parish, where the staunchly pro-abortion, pro-LGBTQ+ “catholic” politician received a standing ovation from parishioners, would you even WANT to be in “horizontal communion” with all the people around you? I don’t have any doubt that the statistical studies are accurate: 70% of those who attend the Novus Ordo do not even believe in the Real Presence in the Eucharist. I can assure you that would NOT be the result of any polling in a TLM parish.
How would being in union with a Pope hostile to the Catholic religion constitute being in union with the Catholic religion?
Vatican Press Office secretary Bruni speaks for Cdl Arthur Roche, prefect Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. That assures it was run by the Cardinal, who has full knowledge of Traditionis Custodes because it was issued from his office likely written at least in part perhaps with assistance from Cdl Victor Fernandez prefect DDF. A typical snow job to protect themselves and the originator Pope Francis.
Can we reasonably presume this brief write off was not brought to Pope Leo’s attention? He’s the one who has ultimate say on how to deal with, not simply the authenticity of Diane Montagna’s collage of excerpts – rather with the crux of the matter. How does Pope Leo wish to address this in context of Cdl Burke’s request? Sadly, the entire snow job write off scenario apparently answers the question.
meiron, you said it best so all I can do is repeat what you’ve written, “Ofcourse the Franciscan-Vatican-spokepeople would like to find a place to hide to keep quiet. That’s exactly what happens when Truth is revealed to previously have been made a lie. Liars will squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp, where it remains perpetually dark. God have mercy.”
In fairness to Pope Leo perhaps he had no choice, assuming he was consulted except to agree to the Press Office secretary’s dismissive explanation. He may on his own time frame an address to the matter more favorably toward the TLM. An indication may be the recent announcement that the Rupnik case judges have been selected.
If that were the case, why didn’t Hagen-Leo just tell his Vatican flacks to stand down and be silent? Instead, it is Hagen-Leo who is silent while his flacks deploy clouds of Bergoglian blather to cover their posteriors as they “squirm, worm, and slither within their swamp.”
That’s been running through my mind too indicated in my initial comment.
Indeed, when a pope, or one who purports to be, is discovered in the act of dissembling, it is not merely a personal failing, or a private stumble in the moral dark. No, it is a cataclysm. I fear for the fledgling soul, barely past the threshold of belief, such a revelation is often a crushing blow. How can one trust in the divine, when its earthly shepherd proves himself a charlatan? The tender shoots of nascent faith, so carefully nurtured, are not merely bruised; they are torn from the very soil of conviction. The young believer, once perhaps drawn by the promise of steadfastness and truth, is left with a gaping wound where his faith once resided, a wound that festers with cynicism and doubt.
Nor are the faithful veterans immune, those seasoned followers who have weathered many a storm of doubt and celebrated countless triumphs of the spirit. For them, the lie from a leader is not a sudden, fatal strike, but rather a slow, insidious erosion. It is akin to a crack appearing in the very foundation of a grand cathedral they have long revered. Each falsehood, each twisting of the truth, however small, drips like acid upon the stone of their enduring faith, weakening its integrity, making them question the very edifice they have spent decades defending. The bedrock of their conviction, once seemingly unshakeable, begins to crumble, and with it, the quiet confidence that once sustained them. For if the very stewards of truth cannot be trusted, then what truth remains? It is a question that gnaws at the soul, a bitter fruit born of betrayal.
So let it be known, and let it be stated with the utmost clarity: the lie, from the mouth of a pope, is not a minor transgression. It is a betrayal of the highest order, an act that not only defiles the speaker but, far more grievously, wounds the very heart of the faithful, both old and new. It is a deed that, far from building the Kingdom, actively dismantles it, brick by painstaking brick.
Brilliant and even poetic analysis, Michael B. Thank you.
Alas , we find that a pope is merely a man after all. It’s like pulling back the curtain and finding the true wizard of Oz. Is it relief or disappointment? Are we so uncomfortable because he looks too much like us?
Popes have “looked like us” since St.Peter. Plus ca change.
If Pope Leo XIV allows the war against the Vetus Ordo Mass to continue, then that would reveal a lot of very bad things about his turn as Pontiff.
“Matteo Bruni…said…the leaked information ‘presumably concerns part of one of the documents on which the decision [to restrict the Latin Mass] is based.’”
So we are led to believe that there were other documents—presumably with more compelling reasons to restrict the Latin Mass—which we are not privy to. Sure! So where are these other documents!?
Oh what a tangled web we weave– when first we begin to deceive!!
Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we “practice” to deceive.
– Sir Walter Scott –
The irony of the whole matter is that the very people who decry the Church becoming more democratic are now
complaining that it not more so! 🤭
The irony of the whole matter is that the very people who proclaim the Church to be a listening, “synodal” Church, reaching out to those on the “margins,” now show themselves to be malevolent totalitarians demanding conformity. There. I fixed it for you.
Nicely done, Stephan. You’re absolutely right.
Synodal schmynodal.
Stephan Williams has decisively answered “Br. Jaques” and his observations about irony.
Oh what a tangled weave they will continue to weave; as we speak, The True Church Of Jesus The Christ is illuminating the darkness of the counterfeit magisterium, which cannot overcome The Way, The Truth, and The Light (Life) of Perfect Divine Eternal Love Incarnate, Our Savior, Jesus The Christ, although it will continue to do some serious damage , if this counterfeit magisterium is not charitably anathema for The Salvation of Souls. Division is not of The Holy Ghost, nor is the counterfeit magisterium of The Holy Ghost, as it serves to accommodate those who deny The Sanctity and Dignity of the marital act within The Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, and The Sanctity and Dignity of human life from the moment of conception to natural death. Without the use of The Charitable Anathema, Instituted by Christ for The Salvation of Souls, this counterfeit magisterium will continue to deny The Unity Of The Holy Ghost, and is thus anti Filioque and anti Pope.
“You cannot be My Disciples if you do not Abide In My Word.” – The Charitable Anathema of Jesus The Christ.
https://www.catechism.cc/articles/Pope-Paul-IV-Ex-Apostolatus-Officio.htm
Is it possible to have a copy of the Holy Mass in latin. I sudied in school where we daly Mass and must answer in latin. Now I have forgoten many parts of them and I will appreciate very much to get a copy. Regards.
Jorge, you can order a Latin Missae on Amazon.
Traditional Latin Mass (red booklet)
Latin/English for $12.60
If you’re OK with an online version: https://extraordinaryform.org/index.html
Mateo Bruni is speaking falsely, whatever his “intentions” might be.
Dianne Montagna has disclosed the conclusion of the majority of Bishops: Summorum Pontificicum was ‘a success,’ and waging a new-liturgy-war against the Vetus Ordo “would cause more harm than good.”
Link:
https://substack.com/inbox/post/167259174?utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true
Therefore, the Pontiff Francis and His Eminence Roche are caught in their lie.
Reject “the ideological lie,” and liberate tradition, or continue to decay unto death.
Only those who are disordered are going to sacrifice themselves for a lie…
Is it true that only 14 pages were leaked out of some 220? Where are the other 200 pages? What do they say?
The 14 pages includes the summary (“Overall Assessment”)of the survey report, similar to an executive summary, along with a collection of quotations from tne survey respondents. (Not just 14 random pages). The Vatican has not released the full report, but the Overall Assessment should contain all of the key points. If the full report says something different, that would be unusual, but the ball is in the Vatican’s court. They can release the full report whenever they want to..
You can read the Overall Assessment on Diane Montagna’s Substack, in the links at the bottom of her first article (there’s a followup). I just searched for “Diane Montagna Substack” and found it quickly. I always like to read these documents, when they are available, rather than relying on bits and pieces in articles and posts.
As in the Paul Newman movie “Cool Hand Luke” (1967): “What we have here is a failure to communicate!”
Back in the 1960s and 1970s, liturgical innovations poisoned the well on the legitimate reform of THE Liturgy. Clown masses and masses of clowns. In the eyes of many and in many locales, the Novus Ordo today still reminds of such early experimentation.
Three questions:
FIRST, is the symmetrical comparison no longer between TLM and Novus Ordo, but rather between the Altar and now the synodal Roundtable? Why are we even reminded that another symmetrical comparison is not between the Bible and the Qur’an, but between the incarnate Jesus Christ (“the Word made flesh”) and the Qur’an (“the word made Book”)?
SECOND, might another symmetrical comparison be between early mismanagement of the liturgical reform (1963) and more recent mismanagement of the sexual abuse crisis? What did Sacrosanctum Concilium actually say about liturgical reform? How about this:
n. 40 (1) “The competent territorial ecclesiastical authority mentioned in Art. 22, 2, must, in this matter, carefully and prudently consider which elements from the traditions and culture of individual peoples might appropriately be admitted into divine worship. Adaptations which are judged to be useful or necessary should then be submitted to the Apostolic See, by whose consent they may be introduced [!].” https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19631204_sacrosanctum-concilium_en.html Can’t remember much about submittals and consents!
THIRD, today, how for the Church to leaven itself ever more as communio and the “ecclesial assembly” around and then beyond the Altar? Instead of as a Roundtable too much replacing Altar—the sacramental Real Presence (CCC 1374)?
SUMMARY: Councils and Synods are what the Church DOES, not what the Church IS.
Perhaps Pope Francis felt a need or saw a need to emphasize and promote a human virtue of getting along with others -as that seemed to him and certain others; however it would still make no sense to enjoin human virtues or any particular human virtue in a synodalism?
Synodalism corrupts the Church’s sacred character, consecrated and lay, cloistered and parochial, active and passive, teaching and apostolic.
My experience with people who lie is that it’s unwise to trust anything they say. The best predictor of future behavior is one’s past actions.
According to Francisca Javiera del Valle in her tome About the Holy Spirit, Christ on the Cross was mediating with the Father to win the Holy Spirit for us, at some moment purely as man when he was moved to cry out about his abandonment. The Father gave answer and it was only then that Christ would admit -surrender,- “It is consummated”, the work upon the Sacrifice.
Well now, just what are some of these priests talking about, sometimes!
In Bible study I was told that Christ was speaking the first verses of Psalm 22. You need to read the entire psalm to see how it applies to Christ’s Crucifixion. I was also told that the Last Supper was an incomplete Passover Seder. Four cups of wine are consumed during the Passover Seder. The third cup, the Cup of Blessing, was used when the Institution of the Eucharist was enacted. The Last Supper then ended before Christ drank the fourth cup. The common wine vinegar that Christ was given on a sponge when He said “I thirst” was the fourth cup. I’ve heard it called the Cup Of Consummation. The Last Supper and Christ’s Passion and Death were one continuous event. This was Christ’s hour.
That’s in keeping with Scott Hahn’s take on the Passover.
But Jesus gave us the New Covenant of the One Cup of His Blood.
It’s possible to suffer through many “cups” more than “4” or “5” and still be in the Communion. Also to suffer a mere “2 cups” yet have the fullness of Communion. Or suffer an inexplicable sudden death with no “cup”.
Many “cups” can vie but Christ focused us on the One.
GregB, a guy could have 40, 50 even 80 cups of suffering and it would account for nothing beyond the One Cup of Salvation shared in Our Lord Jesus Christ.
I believe we should be helping Hahn get away from the Spectral Tru_k-Lo_d of Cups that is stalking him around everywhere. At CWR I have made some entries about that already. See my comments in the first 2 links below; in particular the first one on St. Jerome, Elias Galy October 2, 2024 at 3:10 pm.
In another place in CWR I mentioned that following on the Christ Event, Judaism tried adapting experiences from during that time, into its own ways, to try to overtake it. This would be to maintain interest for the Jews but also “outshine” and diminish and refute the Christ Event and secure “Jewish supremacy”.
See my comment in the third link on Valtorta, Elias Galy September 23, 2021 at 6:36 am, first two paragraphs.
Protestants are reacting to Hahn’s “4 cups” in their own instincts, see the third link Hahn’s Hersey: The Four Cups? at THIRD MILL . ORG. In this example of objections they accuse Hahn of heresy over necessity of Eucharist, which of course is quite wrong; however they raise a number of other reasonable points. Among the points coming up is a reference to evidence that “four cups” only appeared in Passover tradition from the 2nd Century A.D.
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2024/09/30/about-that-brilliant-and-difficult-saint-jerome-of-stridon/
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2019/04/18/when-was-the-last-supper/
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2021/09/14/a-monument-to-pseudo-religiosity-a-case-against-the-poem-of-the-man-god/
https://thirdmill.org/answers/answer.asp/file/45629
I was an altar boy in the 1940’s. We said the Confiteor (I Confess) in Latin at the start of Mass. We knew the words in English.
It was a good start (I Confess) at the start of Mass.
The words were changed in Vatican 11 and the Mass then encountered
many changes (not for the better). Some charlatans and others raised
havoc with the Mass.
It is time (2025) for rebirth of the original Mass.
Look, when you have people like Peter Kwasniewski publishing books and articles and making speeches that the novus ordo Mass needs to be abolished and the church return to celebrating only the TLM (as it was before 1955, no less), then trad world has a big problem with the modern church. That’s the root of their love of the TLM and their hatred of the novus ordo and of Pope Francis: they don’t like modernity and want to go back in time.
Mr. Wright if an individual expresses those views they speak for themselves. They do not speak for everyone who attends the TLM. Nor for someone like me who visits it.
Seems, Mr. Wright, that you have insight into the inner workings and motivations of just about everyone who thinks differently than you. Question: Do you spend much time examining your own mind and heart?
These days many aee inclined to weigh the merits of the men who have most recently occupied the Chair of Peter. I have a challenge to all of us. Think of the recent Popes in terms of which ones would have made a good husband to a wife and a good father to his children. I would assert that only a man who would have made a good husband and father is worthy to be Pope (Abba, Father). As a corollary to this challenge, think of whichcrecent Popes you would have liked to have had as YOUR biological father. I’d suggest applying the same standard to your bishop and your pastor.