You misinterpreted my remark if you thought I had implied that an exercise of papal authority — for good reason and correctly — is analogous to Nazism, fascism, or even plain bad governance. I didn’t ever mean that and the remark was more an expression of a bad stomachache than anything else so I won’t try to defend it. Sorry, NYer.
I WANT the Pope to vigorously exercise his authority to condemn evil and encourage good. However, as the Blessed Virgin had warned us, meanings of good and evil would invert in the latter part of the 20th century and therefore we had a Pope condemning what is good: Lefebvre seeking to preserve the Tridentine rite and protect it from protestantization and bastardization from the vernacular culture. Until just recently, we also witnessed a remarkable tolerance for evil — in terms of culture of death thinking, among other moral perversions, infiltrating certain well-known “Catholic” politicians, hospital administrators (i.e. death pills), priests in the case of sexual improprieties, and others.
Obviously, the modernism and liberalism of the post-Conciliar Church is what gets up the dander of the trads, including myself, along with an outright contempt at times for that which made the Catholic Mass what it is (or was). An example of the latter that comes to mind are those priests who deny communicants the desire to receive the Host on the tongue while kneeling. This is quite common, and has happened to at least one individual multiple times at different parishes. But if you’ll stand, sir, and receive the Host in the hand from a female Eucharistic minister we’ll be more than happy to oblige. This is outrageous and a desecration of the host.
Membership in the Roman Catholic Church is not a dress-up or costume party or a "come as you are" party.
Actually, I peeked into a Novus Ordo Mass a couple Sundays ago from the vestibule after picking up some kids from Sunday School. The dress of several persons attending the Mass did in fact resemble a (beach) costume party.
while remaining in enmity towards the Church
Far be it from enmity, Archbishop Lefebvre possessed enormous love for the Church and the Mass and tried to prevent their destruction.
The Novus Ordo Mass hangs on because bishops reasonably abhor the impudent attitude of the schismatics who claim to speak for tradition while rejecting Church authority. Roger McCaffery who founded Latin Mass Magazine wrote a very wise article there years ago about how it is the liberal bishops who paradoxically have been most generous in allowing Tridentine Masses (probably because they believe that liturgy does not matter or because they want to ghettoize conservative Catholics to their own congregations of like-minded folk where they won't actually see the depredations of the Kumbaya liberal congregations). More conservative bishops with the notable exception of our Rockford conservative bishop Thomas Doran, generally regard the hatred of authority that is the hallmark of Marcel's schism with horror. As a Church, it is easier to survive liturgical follies than to incorporate vicious revolutionary rejection of authority and the anarchy it creates.
Jesus Christ guaranteed that we would survive as a Church in any event but we have no obligation to make the task harder by embracing the markedly unrepentant SSPX vipers. It is a pleasure to reside in the Rockford Diocese where Tridentine worship is made freely available without being sullied by the anarchy that is SSPX.
Southern CA just had a Dixieland Mass. I can't wait for the pictures.