Posted on 12/19/2004 6:36:32 AM PST by Robert Drobot
What further proof is there that we now have two different religions--that of traditional Catholicism, predicated on all previous popes and councils (Trent especially), and this new thing coming out of Rome, in opposition to the past (Trent especially), concocted by modernists? Neither comprehends the other.
You want Aquinas?
--
ST. THOMAS AQUINAS, O.P. (1225-1274)
"Hold firmly that your faith is identical with that of the ancients. Deny this, and you dissolve the unity of the Church."
"There being an imminent danger for the Faith, prelates must be questioned, even publicly, by their subjects. Thus, St. Paul, who was a subject of St. Peter, questioned him publicly on account of an imminent danger of scandal in a matter of Faith. And, as the Glossa of St. Augustine puts it (Ad Galatas 2.14), 'St. Peter himself gave the example to those who govern so that if sometime they stray from the right way, they will not reject a correction as unworthy even if it comes from their subjects....'
"Some say that fraternal correction does not extend to the prelates either because man should not raise his voice against heaven, or because the prelates are easily scandalized if corrected by their subjects. However, this does not happen, since when they sin, the prelates do not represent heaven, and, therefore, must be corrected. And those who correct them charitably do not raise their voices against them, but in their favour, since the admonishment is for their own sake .... For this reason, according to other [authors], the precept of fraternal correction extends also to the prelates, so that they may be corrected by their subjects." (IV Sententiarum, D. 19, Q. 2, A. 2)
Often with the scent of sulphur.
I would think maybe they both had some supernatural guidance in how they approached each individual.
However, Padre Pio's reading of souls is well known and documented in his beatification, and he IS a canonized Saint. Why disparage him? I think he knew what he was doing far better than one who cannot hear confessions, such as a deacon like you or a layperson like me.
Abp. O'Malley closing parishes is not a "danger for the faith". What article of faith does it violate?
I take it that you now admit to schism? You are now publicly admitting that the Church is currently "two different religions" where "(N)either comprehends the other". Two different religions requires at least two different Churches.
Christ is One. Christ established one Church on the 12 Apostles with St. Peter as Her head. I would assume from your writing that "traditional Catholicism" - meaning the SSPX among others - is what you are claiming as the Church Christ founded. This would mean that us Catholics faithful to the Holy See are not His Church and therefore this makes us the ones in schism.
Is my line of reasoning clear on this?
Your post shows the well laid foundation of how all schisms (and most heresies) begin in the Church - and why they continue on and cause damage. The ancient Arian and Nestorian heresies, the Great Schism in the West, the East-West Schism, the Protestant Reformation (Martin Luther, the King of England declaring himself head of the Church in England), the Old Catholics of the 19th Century, .... the list just goes on and on through the Centuries of Church history, being played out in different localities.
The Highest Reason (and a whole lot of Grace) requires me to stay in union with Christ through the Holy See.
Come home Ultima Ratio. A dysfunctional home to be sure, but in substance the real, true, home nonetheless.
1. Here is what Cardinal Ratzinger himself has admitted, in a speech before the bishops of Chile on July 13, 1988:
"The Second Vatican Council has not been treated as a part of the entire living Tradition of the Church, but as an end of Tradition, a new start from zero. The truth is that this particular Council defined no dogma at all, and deliberately chose to remain on a modest level, as a merely pastoral council; and yet many treat it as though it had made itself into a sort of superdogma which takes away the importance of all the rest. This idea is made stronger by things that are now happening. That which previously was considered most holy--the form in which the liturgy was handed down--suddenly appears as the most forbidden of all things, the one thing that can safely be prohibited."
The problem is the Cardinal is in opposition to his own Pontiff who allows such anomalies. The Pope himself has spoken many times of a "New Advent," a "Second Pentecost", indicating he fully believes that the Church is starting up all over again in some new way--a new start from zero, as the Cardinal says.
So let's begin right here and admit that what has been happening the past forty years is not a renewal, it is not a reform--it is a revolution, both in the way the faith is believed and in practice of the faith. Postconciliar "Catholicism", in fact, has far more in common with the beliefs and practices of mainline Protestantism than with the Catholicism of only just forty years ago. In this sense--a very real sense--it is a new religion. As Klaus Gamber pointed out, St. Augustine of the fifth century would have been quite at home at a Catholic liturgy only forty years ago, but would have been totally disoriented by the Novus Ordo, not recognizing it as truly Catholic.
2. You say, "This would mean that us Catholics faithful to the Holy See are not His Church and therefore this makes us the ones in schism."
Not exactly, since you intend no schism and schism resides in the intent. But that said, you are correct after a fashion. Faithfulness to the Holy See at a time when the Holy See itself has departed from Tradition is no guarantee these days that one is practicing the Catholic faith. What clouds the issue is the fact that once upon a time the Holy See was so closely identified with the Church itself that to speak of one was to speak of the other. This is no longer true. In fact, the Holy See itself--the Vatican apparatus--is riddled with apostates, men of little faith, modernists committed to the wrecking of the Church's own Tradition. Some in the bureaucracy, of course, are true men of faith and true Catholics. But many are not.
So of course there is great confusion. And the Pope himself adds to it by making statements and positing actions that scandalize the faithful, suggesting that he believes himself not only to be above Tradition, but that he may even create it. But Tradition is not something popes can create. By definition it is what has been passed down. It is what is inherited, not what is invented. That the Pope actually seems to believe he can invent Tradition, that he believes it is merely whatever he decides it is, and that he is, in fact, the Lord of Tradition and not merely its servant is shocking and scandalous. So also are his many assaults against Tradition. I don't pretend to understand his motives, however. By the same token, it is he, not the SSPX, who goes around praying with witchdoctors and elevating heretics to the college of cardinals.
In any case, you are very wrong to compare the SSPX and other like-minded traditionalists with the heresies and schisms of the past. This is because the Society rejects no doctrine whatsoever and intends no break with the Pontiff. It merely seeks the right to hold onto Tradition and not be forced to reject the Catholic faith. For this it is being persecuted. Yet, as in the words of St. Vincent of Lerins fifteen hundred years ago:
"What should the Catholic Christian therefore do if some part of the Church arrives at the point of detaching itself from the universal communion and the universal faith? What else can he do but prefer the general body which is healthy to the gangrenous and corrupted limb? And if some new contagion strives to poison, not just a small part of the Church but the whole Church at once, then again his great concern will be to attach himself to Antiquity which obviously cannot any more be seduced by any deceptive novelty."
3. All the heresies you mention had as their genesis some rejection of established doctrine. Arianism, in particular, is instructive. Almost the whole Church rejected the traditional teaching on Christ's divinity in the fourth century. One bishop alone bucked the tide--and he was opposed at one point by a weak pontiff. Only Athanasius and his small band of followers held on to the true faith. So your comparison is faulty. It is not to the Arians that you should compare the SSPX, but to that small band of outcasts who stood fast and held onto the faith in the face of almost universal hostility.
So also is the comparison to Martin Luther erroneous. Luther was a revolutionist, the SSPX is not. Luther opposed the Pope unjustly, the SSPX does not. Luther promulgated theological novelties, the SSPX promulgates only the perennial teachings and practices of the Catholic Church from time immemorial. No, the real comparison is between Luther and the modernists who now inhabit the highest reaches of the Vatican. You say, "Come home," but there is nothing to come home to. The faith is now found in hovels, not in palaces in Rome--in small chapels scattered hither and yon across a landscape of disaster.
I think you know U R thinks he is in the Catholic Church and we are in a protestantized schismatic Church. That is the thinking of all schismatics. He isn't going to be open to any rational dialogue. If he ever does repent of his heretical schism it will be due to the Holy Spirit. Heck, he even maintains there was no excomunication of lefevbre et al.
Most of those whom you think comprise the Church have left it long ago. Those who still comprise the Church are the few who hold onto Tradition--which is the sole guarantor of the deposit of faith.
Here is what I posted on another thread regarding the so-called "schism" of Archbishop Lefebvre:
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I would add this to what I've just posted--namely, that there can be no schism without intent. That is impossible. In fact, disobedience per se is not a schismatic act. In the case of Archbishop Lefebvre, his so-called disobedience wasn't even excommunicatable, since he acted in a state of necessity covered by the Pope's own Canon Law and subject to the Archbishop's, not the Pope's, discretion. There never was, therefore, any excommunicatable offense.
The Pope may argue otherwise, but this would not make him correct. In this he would be as fallible as any other man--and in obvious contradiction to his own canons. Certainly no pope can unilaterally decide someone is schismatic--especially when that person declares over and over his loyalty to the Pontiff and prays for the Pontiff daily. Nor can the Archbishop's refusal to agree to be complicit in the destruction of the ancient Mass be construed as schism by the Pope. This is because it is a doctrinal teaching of the Church that no pope has the power to destroy. His job is to protect Tradition, not to destroy it.
The Archbishop, after all, did not act in a vacuum. He had decades of experience with modernism behind him and understood clearly that it was out to wreck Catholic Tradition. He saw even back then how destruction of the faith began with the destruction of the liturgy. The Church was in a process of auto-demolition everywhere. This was not an illusion on his part--it was observable fact. Yet he struggled with his dilemma--how to remain loyal at one and the same time to the pontiff who was in denial and to the faith that was being threatened. Finally the Pontiff pushed him to the wall--and he chose his faith. For this the Pope harshly condemned him.
But this condemnation is a legal reality only. It has, of course, legal ramifications within the Church since the Pontiff is the Supreme Legislator in the Church. But from a another perspective the Pope's condemnation is morally compromised. This is because while no pope is limited from below legally, he is always limited from above morally--by the Divine Law itself. No pope therefore may punish a man who is wholly innocent without violating God's will--especially someone as dedicated to the faith as Archbishop Lefebvre--and especially when the Pope did so without having seriously regarded the sincerity of the Archbishop's resistance on behalf of that faith. If the Pontiff does this, he is acting unjustly and his condemnation is a mere moral nullity--though, as I say, it retains its legal effect.
20 posted on 12/21/2004 3:08:59 AM PST by ultima ratio
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My wife is from the Boston area, and I've had the pleasure of attending many Masses up there where the following is evident:
1. Faithful, orthodox priests (both young and middle-aged)
2. Good music
3. No liturgical abuses, especially the ad-lib crap that goes on in a lot of places.
That being said, under the surface of the VOTF and the Boston scandals, that diocese is producing some excellent new priests, and the Catholic Church there seems to have not fallen off the deep end as some other dioceses (e.g. Baltimore, LA, Milwaukee, etc.) In fact, a priest friend from Boston told me that the epicenter of liberal Catholicism is in the Midwest, not the Northeast. As for me, I reside in the Baltimore Archdiocese, and this place is very infected with the gender-neutral crap, omissions of Mass parts, ad-libbing, very poor homilies, socialist preaching, etc. Even the Churches that have more reverent liturgies still have priests who can't seem to manage to talk about anything spiritual. Not so in Boston...or at least not my experience up there. I predict that Boston will be at the forefront of the Catholic revival led by the young generation of priests up there.
My girlfriend's parents and aunts go to an Italian church in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, even though it is further away than a non-Italian Catholic church in Bay Ridge.
Ed
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