While it is true that independent reading of Scripture is a (comparatively) recent turn in Catholicism, all liturgical texts were based on Scripture. That's something I think most people don't grasp the significance of.
The more Scripture reading the better. The Catholic missionaries were all Scripture-translators: Cyril and Methodius into Slavic, Matteo Ricci into Mandarin, Isaac Jogues into Mohawk, Charles de Foucauld into Tuareg. I think the reason why this prospered more on the "peripheries" than in Europe, --- perhaps --- is because in Europe people saw the splitting and wrecking that occurred in the wake of the Protestant revolt: continent-wide warfare and the proliferation of belligerent movements: Lutherans against Anabaptists, Anglicans against Levelers, and on and on.
The Wars of Religion left Europeans exhausted and disgusted, and paved the way for the militantly antireligious "Enlightenment", the French revolution and the Napoleonic wars in its wake, and the secularization of Europe. You can see the results in the historic strongholds of the Reformation: the die-out of the faith in the British Isles, Scandanavia, northern Germany, the Netherlands.
It became appallingly clear that people who think they can appropriate Scripture for their own purposes, independently, may unwittingly be following the deceiver, the splinterer, Satan, who, as we know, can quote Scripture for his own purposes--- and does.
It doesn't have to turn out that way. With more charity, Scripture would lead to unity. That's what I would like to see.
While I agree that would be good, Rome will have to ditch a lot of its "tradition" and bogus teachings for that to happen.
But I don't see that happening.
No way the RCC would ever admit its understanding of Mary is wrong. They would lose way too much credibility.
As long as it is on ROME'S TERMS...
Mormons can say the same, as Cath "based on Scripture" means, among other thing s, unScriptural beliefs such as the the novel and premise of ensured perpetual magisterial infallibility; to presbyteros wrongly being distinctly called "hiereus" due to imposed functional equivalence; and presumptuously requiring basically all of them to have the gift of celibacy; to praying to created beings in Heaven.
Meanwhile, the actual Scripture hearing in Mass is largely redundant, or only small portions of Scripture, while the preaching of such is typically a perfunctionary 10 minute sermonette.
The more Scripture reading the better.
That was not the overall attitude of medieval Rome where she predominated.
I think the reason why this prospered more on the "peripheries" than in Europe, --- perhaps --- is because in Europe people saw the splitting and wrecking that occurred in the wake of the Protestant revolt: continent-wide warfare and the proliferation of belligerent movements: Lutherans against Anabaptists, Anglicans against Levelers, and on and on.
Such reasoning can be used be dictators to prevents dissension as well, seeing as freedom of thought has so often resulted in division. Indeed, if God has not given men the freedom to choose then the world would be perfect. Cults, which operate under the Roman sola ecclesia model, typically have the greatest degree of unity, which today Rome has less of, much due to the loss of her unholy sword of men. But such cultic unity is not Scriptural, and the limited degree of Scriptural NT unity was under Scriptural substantiation in word and in power, with men who could say they were, "in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God,... By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, By the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left... (2 Corinthians 6:4,7)
Rome's pseudo-successors lack both the qualifications and credentials of NT apostles, (Acts 1:21,22; 1Cor. 9:1; Gal. 1:11,17; 2Cor. 6:4-10; 12:12) and disunity is a judgment for lacking this manner of holy men.
Meanwhile, you left out what can happen when Rome loses her cultic control, and what happened prior to the needed, if imperfect, Reform-ation in the light of RC deformation :
"For nearly half a century, the Church was split into two or three obediences that excommunicated one another, so that every Catholic lived under excommunication by one pope or another, and, in the last analysis, no one could say with certainty which of the contenders had right on his side. The Church no longer offered certainty of salvation; she had become questionable in her whole objective form--the true Church, the true pledge of salvation, had to be sought outside the institution."
"It is against this background of a profoundly shaken ecclesial consciousness that we are to understand that Luther, in the conflict between his search for salvation and the tradition of the Church, ultimately came to experience the Church, not as the guarantor, but as the adversary of salvation. (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Sacred Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith for the Church of Rome, “Principles of Catholic Theology,” trans. by Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, S.N.D. (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1989) p.196). http://www.whitehorseinn.org/blog/2012/06/13/whos-in-charge-here-the-illusions-of-church-infallibility/)
Meanwhile, it was Protestant America that provided refuge for RCs, though many Founders were justifiably wary of allowing them.
Of which Benjamin Franklin (1706—1790. One of the Founding Fathers; leading thinker; author; printer; statesman; postmaster; diplomat, and a non-Christian deist) wrote, — ...serious religion, under its various denominations, is not only tolerated, but respected and practiced. Atheism is unknown there; Infidelity rare and secret; so that persons may live to a great age in that country without having their piety shocked by meeting with either an Atheist or an Infidel. And the Divine Being seems to have manifested His approbation of the mutual forbearance and kindness by which the different sects treat each other, and by the remarkable prosperity with which He has been please to favor the whole country. (Benjamin Franklin, "Information to those who would Remove to America" In Franklin, Benjamin. The Bagatelles from Passy. Ed. Lopez, Claude A. New York: Eakins Press. 1967; http://mith.umd.edu//eada/html/display.php?docs=franklin_bagatelle4.xml. Also, John Gould Curtis, American history told by contemporaries .... Volume 3, p. 26)
And, Alexis de Tocqueville (1805—1859. French political thinker and historian; best known for his two volume, “Democracy in America”) — The sects that exist in the United States are innumerable. They all differ in respect to the worship which is due to the Creator; but they all agree in respect to the duties which are due from man to man. Each sect adores the Deity in its own peculiar manner, but all sects preach the same moral law in the name of God...Moreover, all the sects of the United States are comprised within the great unity of Christianity, and Christian morality is everywhere the same...
In the United States the sovereign authority is religious, and consequently hypocrisy must be common; but there is no country in the whole world in which the Christian religion retains a greater influence over the souls of men than in America, and there can be no greater proof of its utility, and of its conformity to human nature, than that its influence is most powerfully felt over the most enlightened and free nation of the earth...
There is certainly no country in the world where the tie of marriage is more respected than in America or where conjugal happiness is more highly or worthily appreciated, In Europe almost all the disturbances of society arise from the irregularities of domestic life. To despise the natural bonds and legitimate pleasures of home is to contract a taste for excesses, a restlessness of heart, and fluctuating desires. Agitated by the tumultuous passions that frequently disturb his dwelling, the European is galled by the obedience which the legislative powers of the state exact. But when the American retires from the turmoil of public life to the bosom of his family, he finds in it the image of order and of peace...
The Americans combine the notions of Christianity and of liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive the one without the other; and with them this conviction does not spring from that barren traditionary faith which seems to vegetate in the soul rather than to live...
Thus religious zeal is perpetually warmed in the United States by the fires of patriotism. These men do not act exclusively from a consideration of a future life; eternity is only one motive of their devotion to the cause. If you converse with these missionaries of Christian civilization, you will be surprised to hear them speak so often of the goods of this world, and to meet a politician where you expected to find a priest.
They will tell you that "all the American republics are collectively involved with each other; if the republics of the West were to fall into anarchy, or to be mastered by a despot, the republican institutions which now flourish upon the shores of the Atlantic Ocean would be in great peril. It is therefore our interest that the new states should be religious, in order that they may permit us to remain free." (Democracy in America, Volume I Chapter XVII, 1835; http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/DETOC/religion/ch1_17.htm)
Both the NT church and American began under principled dissent, but not against the idea of authority, but with exceptional men who held that authority cannot be autocratic (which Rome makes herself), despite its efficiency, but must be held accountable, with Scripture being the explicit (in the former case) and implicit supreme source of spiritual and moral Truth.
The present contrary condition in America is not due to SS with its basic hermeneutic, but corresponds to the increasing demotion of Scripture and declension from holding it as being the wholly inspired and accurate word of God - which liberal revisionism RC scholarship has taught for decades now even in her own NAB Bible.
You can see the results in the historic strongholds of the Reformation:
And in contrast to the historic strongholds of Catholicism? The Inquisitons, which some RCs here seem to long for with all their unScriptural means, would have a field day in such places as Spain, while multitudes of lost RCs have found life in evangelical churches, far more than apostates who cross the Tiber from there.
>It became appallingly clear that people who think they can appropriate Scripture for their own purposes,
You mean RCs do not have a great deal of liberty to interpret Scripture in seeking to support traditions of Rome, and that those who hold most strongly to the authority of Scripture as the wholly inspired and accurate word of God are not far more unified in basic beliefs than the fruit of Rome overall?
It became appallingly clear that people who think they can appropriate Scripture for their own purposes, independently, may unwittingly be following the deceiver, the splinterer, Satan, who, as we know, can quote Scripture for his own purposes--- and does.
Thus according to Roman reasoning, God should not allow the devil to read Scripture, but instead, it was by Scripture that the Lord defeated the devil, overcoming error with Truth, (Mt. 4) while Rome increasingly elevated Tradition with their resorted to due to their inability to deal with heretics by Scripture, which they subsequently worked to prevent the laity from freely accessing on their own.
Meanwhile, division because of love of the Truth is superior than unity in error, which is where Rome sees her greatest unity, while her limited unity is largely a paper one, as Catholicism exists in schisms and sects, formal and informal, the latter of which Rome implicitly sanctions.
It doesn't have to turn out that way. With more charity, Scripture would lead to unity. That's what I would like to see.
Thus V2 must be unloving, since here you have RCs claiming that Catholicism exists in remnant form, with he SSPX being what is faithful to tradition, while other RCs call the former "Protestant" in essence, since they determine what to believe based upon their interpretation of what historical teaching means, rather than, "the one duty of the multitude is to allow themselves to be led, and, like a docile flock, to follow the Pastors." (VEHEMENTER NOS),
As one poster wryly commented,
The last time the church imposed its judgment in an authoritative manner on "areas of legitimate disagreement," the conservative Catholics became the Sedevacantists and the Society of St. Pius X, the moderate Catholics became the conservatives, the liberal Catholics became the moderates, and the folks who were excommunicated, silenced, refused Catholic burial, etc. became the liberals. The event that brought this shift was Vatican II; conservatives then couldn't handle having to actually obey the church on matters they were uncomfortable with, so they left. — Nathan, http://www.ratzingerfanclub.com/blog/2005/05/fr-michael-orsi-on-different-levels-of.html