For the promotion and dissemination of the Extraordinary Form of the Mass in the Archdiocese of Malta and the Diocese of Gozo, as endorsed by the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum promulgated by Pope Benedict XVI (2007) and in the Instruction Universae Ecclesiae (2011). This goes hand in hand with what the Second Vatican Council stated in the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy Sacrosanctum Concilium of 1963: Linguae latinae usus, salvo particulari iure, in ritibus latinis servetur.
Appeal for prayers and penances for the Liberty of the Traditional Mass in Lent
From Una Voce International and others
Una Voce International and other organisations, groups and individuals concerned with the Traditional Latin Mass would like to appeal to all Catholics of good will to offer prayers and penances during the season of Lent, particularly for the intention: the liberty of the Traditional Mass.
We do not know how credible rumours of further documents from the Holy See on this subject may be, but the rumours themselves point to a situation of doubt, conflict, and apprehension, which is severely harmful to the mission of the Church. We appeal to our Lord, through His Blessed Mother, to restore to all Catholics the right and opportunity to worship according to the Church’s own venerable liturgical traditions, in perfect unity with the Holy Father and the bishops of the whole Church.
A Dec. 31 statement from the Holy See press office said: “With sorrow I inform you that the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, passed away today at 9:34 in the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican. Further information will be provided as soon as possible.”
Benedict XVI helped to shape the Catholic Church’s trajectory long before he was elected to the papacy, first as a young theological adviser at the Second Vatican Council and then as head of the Vatican’s doctrinal office.
Benedict influenced generations of Catholics with his writings, including his 1968 book “Introduction to Christianity,” his treatise “The Spirit of the Liturgy,” and his trilogy “Jesus of Nazareth,” composed while he was pope.
He reflected deeply on the tensions between secular modernity and the Church, introducing phrases such as “the dictatorship of relativism” into Catholic discourse and popularizing the concept of Catholics serving as a “creative minority” within secularized societies.
As pope from 2005 to 2013, he led the Church’s response to the clerical abuse crisis, dismissing hundreds of perpetrators from the clerical state. But he later personally asked forgiveness from abuse survivors amid criticism of his handling of cases as archbishop of Munich, southern Germany, from 1977 to 1982.
Awaiting Easter
He was born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger on April 16, 1927, in Marktl am Inn, a village in the German state of Bavaria. In his 1998 memoir Milestones, he noted that he emerged into the world on Holy Saturday.
“I have always been filled with thanksgiving for having had my life immersed in this way in the Easter mystery, since this could only be a sign of blessing,” he wrote. “To be sure, it was not Easter Sunday but Holy Saturday, but, the more I reflect on it, the more this seems to be fitting for the nature of our human life: We are still awaiting Easter; we are still not standing in the full light, but walking toward it in full trust.”
He was the third child after his sister Maria and brother Georg, who went on to become a priest and conductor of the renowned Regensburger Domspatzen choir. His mother was a cook and his father a police officer who was disciplined after criticizing the Nazis.
An intellectually precocious child who disliked school sports, he entered a minor seminary in 1939, at the age of 12. That year, German youngsters were legally required to join the Hitler Youth. He was enrolled but avoided attending meetings of the Nazi organization.
After the Second World War broke out, the seminary was shuttered and he was drafted into the military, serving in an anti-aircraft unit and helping to prepare anti-tank defenses. He abandoned his post in 1945 as the Allies swept into Germany, although the penalty for desertion was death.
In “Milestones,” he described how he attempted to reach home on foot without being detected. “But, as I walked out of a railroad underpass, two soldiers were standing at their posts, and for a moment the situation was extremely critical for me,” he wrote. “Thank God that they, too, had had their fill of war and did not want to become murderers.”
He was reunited briefly with his family, but then seized by U.S. forces and interned in a prisoner-of-war camp near the city of Ulm. He slept outdoors, but was consoled by the sight of the spire of Ulm cathedral. “Day after day the sight of it was for me like a consoling proclamation of the indestructible humaneness of faith,” he later wrote.
When he was finally released, the driver of a milk truck gave him a lift back to his hometown. He reached it before sunset, recalling that “the heavenly Jerusalem itself could not have appeared more beautiful to me at that moment.”
He returned to his seminary studies and was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising on June 29, 1951, at the age of 24. When the archbishop placed his hands on him during the rite, a bird flew up from the high altar and began to sing, which he took to be “a reassurance from on high” that he was on the right path.
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger with Pope Paul VI. Jornal O Bom Católico via Wikimedia (CC BY 2.0).
Coworker of the truth
After earning a doctorate, Ratzinger began teaching, and his reputation as a theologian grew. Cologne’s Cardinal Joseph Frings asked him to serve as a peritus, or adviser, at Vatican II, one of the major Catholic events of the 20th century.
He supported the reforming current at the ecumenical council and afterward received an invitation from the prominent progressive theologian Hans Küng to teach at the renowned University of Tübingen. But there he concluded that the Council’s reforms were being distorted by activists imbued with the revolutionary spirit of the late 1960s. “Anyone who wanted to remain a progressive in this context had to give up his integrity,” he said decades later.
He left Tübingen in 1969 to teach at the less prestigious University of Regensburg in his Bavarian homeland. That year, he made a radio broadcast in which he pondered the Church’s future.
“From the crisis of today,” he said, “the Church of tomorrow will emerge — a Church that has lost much. She will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning.”
But in the end, he predicted, “the church of faith” would remain. “It may well no longer be the dominant social power to the extent that she was until recently; but it will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as Man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death,” he said.
In 1972, Ratzinger helped to found the influential theological journal Communio, with fellow theological luminaries Hans Urs von Balthasar and Henri de Lubac.
He was appointed Archbishop of Munich and Freising on May 28, 1977, at the relatively young age of 49. He took the motto “Cooperatores veritatis” (“Coworkers of the truth”), drawn from 3 John 8. He was made a cardinal a month after his episcopal ordination.
His tenure in Munich was overshadowed decades later by a report that accused him of mishandling four abuse cases. He denied claims that he had sought to cover up wrongdoing, but in a letter issued in 2022, he said: “I have had great responsibilities in the Catholic Church. All the greater is my pain for the abuses and the errors that occurred in those different places during the time of my mandate.”
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in Szczepanów, Poland, on May 10, 2003. Muu-karhu via Wikimedia (CC BY 2.0).
Doctrinal defender
Pope John Paul II summoned Ratzinger to Rome in 1981 to serve as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The Polish pope believed that the decades after Vatican II were marred by a theological free-for-all and encouraged the cardinal to help restore a sense of balance.
Ratzinger took action against prominent theologians he believed had departed from Catholic teaching, including the Brazilian liberation theologian Leonardo Boff, the Sri Lankan priest Tissa Balasuriya, and the Belgian Jesuit Jacques Dupuis.
These actions made him a controversial figure among Catholics on the Church’s progressive wing, who referred to him as the “Panzer Cardinal” and “God’s Rottweiler.” He complained that he was being cast as a bogeyman when he was only seeking to help simple believers recognize misleading accounts of the faith.
With John Paul II’s unflagging support, he tackled the Church’s most contested topics, from women priests to homosexuality. He also sought to present Catholic teaching in a positive light in his personal theological works and through his labor on the 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church, a monumental guide to the faith.
After the turn of the millennium, he continued to serve as a theological lightning rod. In the year 2000, he signed the declaration Dominus Iesus, which affirmed that there is “a single Church of Christ, which subsists in the Catholic Church” — prompting criticism from Protestant leaders.
In 2001, Ratzinger convinced John Paul II to allow his Vatican congregation to investigate cases of clerical abuse worldwide. Once a week, he would read through dossiers on accused priests, a practice he referred to as “our Friday penance.” Between 2004 and 2014, 848 priests were laicized and 2,572 given other penalties.
In a 2004 lecture on Europe’s Christian roots, Ratzinger invoked the historian Arnold Toynbee’s idea of “creative minorities” who help to revitalize civilizations. “Christian believers should look upon themselves as just such a creative minority, and help Europe to reclaim what is best in its heritage and to therefore place itself at the service of all humankind,” he said.
In light of his age and bouts of ill health, he tried to resign several times, but continued to work as the Vatican’s doctrinal enforcer until John Paul II’s death in 2005.
Ratzinger presided at the Polish pope’s funeral, before a television audience of more than 2 billion. In his role as dean of the College of Cardinals, he preached to the world’s cardinals before they entered the conclave to elect John Paul II’s successor. He warned them that “having a clear faith based on the Creed of the Church is often labeled as fundamentalism,” while a “dictatorship of relativism” was being built “that does not recognize anything as definitive and whose ultimate goal consists solely of one’s own ego and desires.”
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger presides at the funeral of Pope John Paul II on April 8, 2005. Ricardo Stuckert/PR - Agência Brasil via Wikimedia (CC BY 3.0 br).
The Church is alive
After four ballots, he was elected pope on April 19, 2005, at the age of 78. He chose the name Benedict XVI in honor of Benedict XV, who “guided the Church through the turbulent times of the First World War,” and St. Benedict, “a fundamental point of reference for the unity of Europe.”
At his installation Mass, he appeared to acknowledge the forces arrayed against him, asking for prayers “that I may not flee for fear of the wolves.” But he also struck a hopeful note, saying that in his predecessor’s last days, “it became wonderfully evident to us that the Church is alive. And the Church is young.”
“She holds within herself the future of the world and therefore shows each of us the way towards the future,” he said.
His almost eight-year pontificate was marked by a series of crises.
The most challenging and extended was the abuse crisis. Just two months after his election, he imposed restrictions on Fr. Marcial Maciel, the powerful founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who appeared to have been protected by figures at the Vatican despite evidence of his depravity.
The global media repeatedly accused Benedict XVI of having covered up abuse as an archbishop in Germany and a prefect in Rome — claims firmly rejected by his supporters.
He met abuse survivors during his foreign visits and sent a landmark letter to Irish Catholics in 2010, acknowledging that some abuse survivors “find it difficult even to enter the doors of a church after all that has occurred.”
Another crisis occurred in 2006, when he gave an address at the University of Regensberg in Germany in which he cited a Byzantine emperor who told a Muslim interlocutor that Mohammed had brought into the world “things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”
Benedict noted that the emperor delivered the words with “a brusqueness that we find unacceptable,” but his speech was reported around the world as if he had endorsed the remark. Muslims erupted in protest from Jordan to Indonesia.
Two months later, he made a conciliatory visit to Turkey, pausing for a moment of reflection alongside an Islamic cleric in Istanbul’s Blue Mosque.
In 2009, he sparked a another crisis when he lifted the excommunications of four bishops belonging to the Society of St. Pius (SSPX), the breakaway group founded by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. The move coincided with an interview in which one of the four, Bishop Richard Williamson, denied the Holocaust. Benedict wrote an apologetic letter to the world’s bishops, noting that he had been told “that consulting the information available on the internet would have made it possible to perceive the problem early on.”
As pope, he made far-reaching decisions on the liturgy, ecumenism, and Vatican finances.
His 2007 motu proprio Summorum Pontificum acknowledged priests’ right to offer Mass using the Roman Missal of 1962, which is in Latin. He defined the new and old versions of the Roman Missal as the “ordinary” and “extraordinary” forms of the Roman Rite, expressing the hope that they would be “mutually enriching.”
In his 2009 apostolic constitution Anglicanorum coetibus, he established personal ordinariates enabling groups of Anglicans to enter into full communion with Rome while preserving elements of their patrimony.
In 2010, he attempted to shed light on the Vatican’s notoriously opaque finances with the creation of a watchdog body, the Financial Information Authority. His efforts at reform were undermined by a series of leaked documents in what came to be known as the “Vati-Leaks” scandal, which led to the jailing of his butler.
Despite his advanced age, he made trips to countries including Australia, Brazil, and Benin. In 2008, he undertook a six-day visit to the United States, addressing the United Nations General Assembly, praying at Ground Zero, and visiting the White House.
He beatified more than 800 people, including Cardinal John Henry Newman, canonized 45 others, and proclaimed St. Hildegard of Bingen and St. John of Avila Doctors of the Church.
He published three encyclicals: Deus caritas est, on love; Spe salvi, on hope; and Caritas in Veritate, on charity. His fourth, Lumen fidei, was left unfinished and completed by his successor Pope Francis.
Throughout his pontificate, he stressed the continuity of the Catholic faith. Speaking to Vatican officials in 2005, he criticized those who interpreted Vatican II in terms of “discontinuity and rupture,” arguing that it should be understood instead with a “hermeneutic of reform” that did not imply “a split between the pre-conciliar Church and the post-conciliar Church.”
Benedict XVI resigned on Feb. 11, 2013, announcing the dramatic break with centuries of tradition in Latin to an audience of shocked cardinals. He told them that “both strength of mind and body” were necessary to govern the Church, but that strength had “deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me.”
His resignation took effect on Feb. 28, 2013, when he departed Vatican City by helicopter. Arriving at the papal summer residence of Castel Gandolfo, he described himself as “simply a pilgrim who is starting the last stage of his pilgrimage on Earth.”
“Let us go ahead together with the Lord for the good of the Church and of the world,” he said, before departing into retirement.
Benedict XVI adopted the title “pope emeritus” and continued to wear white — choices that critics said might lead Catholics to think he was still pope. He settled in a new home, the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery in the Vatican Gardens. He was 85 years old and not expected to live long, though the Vatican had not indicated a terminal illness. But over the next 10 years, he remained active.
His first public appearance after his resignation came in February 2014, at Pope Francis’ first consistory for the creation of new cardinals. Months later, he was present at the canonization of John Paul II and John XXIII.
In retirement, he continued his long collaboration with the journalist Peter Seewald. Together, they produced the 2016 book-length interview “Last Testament,” their fourth after “Salt of the Earth” (1997), “God and the World” (2002), and “Light of the World” (2010). They also worked together on a multi-volume biography “Benedict XVI: A Life,” published in German in 2020.
He occasionally generated controversy in retirement, contributing in 2019 to a book supporting clerical celibacy amid a debate about a relaxation of the discipline in the Amazon region. In an essay published in the same year, he was accused of blaming clerical abuse on the sexual revolution of the 1960s. But he insisted that his point was that the crisis was caused by a turning away from God.
Catholics around the world continued to cherish the German pope in his retirement. On his 95th birthday, thousands of people sent messages via a website dedicated to his work.
His longtime personal secretary Archbishop Georg Gänswein confided that Benedict himself was surprised by his longevity, recalling that he once said: “I would never have believed that the last stretch of the journey that would take me from the Mater Ecclesiae Monastery to the gates of heaven with St. Peter would be so long.”
Benedict XVI was born on April 16, 1927. He died on Dec. 31, 2022, aged 95.
I 6 pastori protestanti che aiutarono a inventare la nuova Messa: fotografati in Vaticano il 10 aprile 1970, accanto a Paolo VI (a destra); da sinistra: Dott. George; Canon Jasper; Dott. Shephard; Dott. Konneth; Dott. Eugene Brand e Padre Max Thurian; in rappresentanza del Consiglio Mondiale delle Chiese, della chiesa d'Inghilterra, della chiesa luterana e della comunità di Taize.
Il solo motivo che può autorizzare un cattolico a resistere all’autorità nella Chiesa è la fede. In particolare, per quel che riguarda la liturgia, solo la fede può motivare il rifiuto del nuovo rito della messa ed il motivo fondamentale per cui ogni sacerdote e fedele non può accettare il Novus ordo è proprio perché «rappresenta, sia nel suo insieme come nei particolari, un impressionante allontanamento dalla teologia cattolica» [1]
Tale allontanamento dalla teologia cattolica è conseguenze di un avvicinamento, voluto e consentito, alla dottrina ed alla liturgia protestante come ha dichiarato lo stesso Paolo VI stesso che ha introdotto il nuovo rito: «Allo sforzo richiesto ai fratelli separati perché si riuniscano, deve corrispondere lo sforzo, altrettanto mortificante per noi, di purificare la Chiesa romana nei suoi riti, perché diventi desiderabile e abitabile» [2].
Di fatto, come è risaputo, Paolo VI domandò a sei pastori protestanti di prendere parte alla commissione incaricata di realizzare la nuova Messa. Uno di essi, Max Thurian, della comunità di Taizé, in occasione della pubblicazione del nuovo messale, potrà dichiarare: «In questa Messa rinnovata, non c’è niente che possa veramente disturbare i protestanti evangelici» [3].
Padre Bugnini non ha mai nascosto le sue intenzioni ecumeniche. Sulle colonne dell’ Osservatore Romano, dichiarò che la riforma liturgica è stata improntata al «desiderio di scartare ogni pietra che potesse costituire anche solo l’ombra di un rischio di inciampo o di dispiacere per i fratelli separati» [4]. Per questo ha ammesso riguardo alla nuova messa che si tratta «in certi punti, di una vera nuova creazione, dato che l’immagine della liturgia data dal Concilio Vaticano II è completamente differente da quella che la Chiesa cattolica ha avuto finora» [5].
Molti esponenti di rilievo del mondo protestante – che naturalmente avevano sempre rifiutato la Messa tradizionale – hanno affermato che vi è più nessuna difficoltà nell’utilizzare il nuovo rito per celebrare la cena protestante. Oltre al già citato Max Thurian, si possono menzionare, tra gli altri, G. Siegwalt (in Le Monde del 22 novembre 1970); O. Jordahn (conferenza del 15 giugno 1975 nell’abbazia di santa Maria Laach); infine, la Dichiarazione ufficiale del «Concistoro superiore della Chiesa della Confessione di Augusta, di Alsazia e di Lorena» dell’8 dicembre 1973 [6].
A nuova liturgia corrisponde una nuova fede per il rapporto intimo che vi è fra la lex orandi e la lex credendi [7] e la nuova architettura delle Chiese post-conciliari, ispirate e volute da questo cambiamento lo manifestano in maniera eclatante. Per questo la nuova messa è pericolosa per la fede e induce i fedeli che vi assistono a una professione esterna contraria alla fede.
La nostra fedeltà al rito tradizionale quindi non è motivata da un attaccamento nostalgico al latino, all’incenso, ai pizzi e merletti e neppure ad un certo rituale ma essenzialmente dal dovere di conservare la fede ed aiutare i fedeli a fare altrettanto.
Per questo non accetteremo mai il nuovo rito riformato, così vicino alla “messa” di Lutero, e per questo incoraggiamo i fedeli a fare tutti i sacrifici per assistere alla Messa di sempre e fuggire le nuove celebrazioni, incoraggiando i sacerdoti a celebrare unicamente secondo il rito tradizionale.
4 - Cfr. La Documentation Catholique, n. 1445 (1965), col. 604. In questo quadro appare del tutto verosimile, anche se non verificabile con assoluta certezza, l’informazione che mons. Bugnini (divenuto vescovo nel 1972) appartenesse alla massoneria: la massoneria, infatti, ha sempre predicato la parità di tutte le religioni, e dunque per un massone il nuovo rito della Messa si presenta molto meno sgradevole, sotto questo profilo, rispetto a quello tradizionale. I fatti sarebbero questi: nel 1975 mons. Bugnini fu denunciato come massone a Paolo VI; l’ecclesiastico che lo accusava forniva delle prove e minacciava di rendere la cosa pubblica. Paolo VI prese la cosa molto sul serio: per evitare lo scandalo sollevò immediatamente mons. Bugnini dalle sue funzioni di segretario della Congregazione per il culto divino e, nel gennaio 1976, lo nominò pronunzio a Teheran. Successivamente il nome di Annibale Bugnini è comparso nelle liste di prelati massoni pubblicate dalla stampa (liste pubblicate da Panorama, n. 538 del 10 agosto 1976, e poi nell’Osservatore Politico di Mino Pecorelli il 12 settembre 1978). Su questo caso, si può consultare l’inchiesta del dott. C. A. Agnoli, La massoneria alla conquista della Chiesa, ed. Eiles, Roma 1996.
5 - A. Bugnini, Dichiarazione alla stampa (4 gennaio 1967), in La Documentation Catholique, n. 1491 (1967), col. 824.
6 - Catéchisme catholique de la crise dans l’Eglise, Mathias Gaudron, Le Sel 2007 p. 178
"There is no doubt," says the devout Father Rossignoli, "that on their entrance into eternal glory the first favours which they ask of the Divine Mercy are for those who have opened to them the gates of Paradise, and they will never fail to pray for their benefactors, whenever they see them in any necessity or danger. In reverses of fortune, sicknesses, and accidents of all kinds they will be their protectors. Their zeal will increase when the interests of the soul are at stake; they will powerfully assist them to vanquish temptation, to practise good works, to die a Christian death, and to escape the sufferings of the other life."
Cardinal Baronius, whose authority as historian is well known, relates that a person who was very charitable towards the holy souls was afflicted with a terrible agony when on her deathbed. The spirit of darkness suggested to her the most gloomy fears, and veiled from her sight the sweet light of Divine Mercy, endeavouring to drive her into despair; when suddenly Heaven seemed to open before her eyes, and she saw thousands of defenders fly to her aid, reanimating her courage, and promising her the victory. Comforted by this unexpected assistance, she asked who were her defenders? "We are," they replied, " the souls which you have delivered from Purgatory; we, in our turn, come to help you, and very soon we shall conduct you to Paradise." At these consoling words the sick person felt that her fears were changed into the sweetest confidence. A short time afterwards she tranquilly expired, her countenance serene and her heart filled with joy.
Extract from Purgatory Explained by the Lives and Legends of the Saints, by Fr. F.X. Schouppe, S.j., Tan Books 1986, pp. 317-320
An urgent meeting of the newly-elected Committee of Pro Tridentina (Malta) discussed the latest document issued by Pope Francis, namely Desiderio Desideravi. It is our understanding that based upon p. 61 of this document, the Tridentine Mass currently being celebrated at the Jesuit Church in Valletta / St. Paul Church, Valletta might soon not be allowed anymore. The reason being that it is a Diocesan Mass. Thankfully, the previous Committee of Pro Tridentina (Malta) has ensured that Tridentine Mass can continue to be celebrated by Fr Anthony, outside diocesan restrictions. still, it is painful for us to read such a document, the latest in a series of attacks targeting Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI.
Following is the afore-mentioned p. 61 of Desiderio Desideravi:
61. In this letter I have wanted simply to share some reflections which most certainly do not exhaust the immense treasure of the celebration of the holy mysteries. I ask all the bishops, priests, and deacons, the formators in seminaries, the instructors in theological faculties and schools of theology, and all catechists to help the holy people of God to draw from what is the first wellspring of Christian spirituality. We are called continually to rediscover the richness of the general principles exposed in the first numbers of Sacrosanctum Concilium, grasping the intimate bond between this first of the Council’s constitutions and all the others. For this reason we cannot go back to that ritual form which the Council fathers, cum Petro et sub Petro, felt the need to reform, approving, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit and following their conscience as pastors, the principles from which was born the reform. The holy pontiffs St. Paul VI and St. John Paul II, approving the reformed liturgical books ex decreto Sacrosancti OEcumenici Concilii Vaticani II, have guaranteed the fidelity of the reform of the Council. For this reason I wrote Traditionis custodes, so that the Church may lift up, in the variety of so many languages, one and the same prayer capable of expressing her unity.[23 Cf. Paulus VI, Constitutio apostolica Missale Romanum (3 Aprilis 1969) in AAS 61 (1969) 222.]
From the encyclicalMediator Dei of Pope Pius XII (1947).
23. The worship rendered by the Church to God must be, in its entirety, interior as well as exterior. It is exterior because the nature of man as a composite of body and soul requires it to be so. Likewise, because divine Providence has disposed that “while we recognize God visibly, we may be drawn by Him to love of things unseen.”[26 – Roman Missal, Preface for Christmas.] Every impulse of the human heart, besides, expresses itself naturally through the senses; and the worship of God, being the concern not merely of individuals but of the whole community of mankind, must therefore be social as well. This obviously it cannot be unless religious activity is also organized and manifested outwardly. Exterior worship, finally, reveals and emphasizes the unity of the mystical Body, feeds new fuel to its holy zeal, fortifies its energy, intensifies its action day by day: “for although the ceremonies themselves can claim no perfection or sanctity in their won right, they are, nevertheless, the outward acts of religion, designed to rouse the heart, like signals of a sort, to veneration of the sacred realities, and to raise the mind to meditation on the supernatural. They serve to foster piety, to kindle the flame of charity, to increase our faith and deepen our devotion. They provide instruction for simple folk, decoration for divine worship, continuity of religious practice. They make it possible to tell genuine Christians from their false or heretical counterparts.”[27]
24. But the chief element of divine worship must be interior. For we must always live in Christ and give ourselves to Him completely, so that in Him, with Him and through Him the heavenly Father may be duly glorified. The sacred liturgy requires, however, that both of these elements be intimately linked with each another. This recommendation the liturgy itself is careful to repeat, as often as it prescribes an exterior act of worship. Thus we are urged, when there is question of fasting, for example, “to give interior effect to our outward observance.”[28 – Roman Missal, Secret for Thursday after the Second Sunday of Lent.] Otherwise religion clearly amounts to mere formalism, without meaning and without content. You recall, Venerable Brethren, how the divine Master expels from the sacred temple, as unworthily to worship there, people who pretend to honor God with nothing but neat and well-turned phrases, like actors in a theater, and think themselves perfectly capable of working out their eternal salvation without plucking their inveterate vices from their hearts.[29] It is, therefore, the keen desire of the Church that all of the faithful kneel at the feet of the Redeemer to tell Him how much they venerate and love Him. She wants them present in crowds – like the children whose joyous cries accompanied His entry into Jerusalem – to singtheir hymns and chant their song of praise and thanksgiving to Him who is King of Kings and Source of every blessing. She would have them move their lips in prayer, sometimes in petition, sometimes in joy and gratitude, and in this way experience His merciful aid and power like the apostles at the lakeside of Tiberias, or abandon themselves totally, like Peter on Mount Tabor, to mystic union with the eternal God in contemplation.
25. It is an error, consequently, and a mistake to think of the sacred liturgy as merely the outward or visible part of divine worship or as an ornamental ceremonial. No less erroneous is the notion that it consists solely in a list of laws and prescriptions according to which the ecclesiastical hierarchy orders the sacred rites to be performed.
26. It should be clear to all, then, that God cannot be honoured worthily unless the mind and heart turn to Him in quest of the perfect life, and that the worship rendered to God by the Church in union with her divine Head is the most efficacious means of achieving sanctity.
One of the dangers of being a traditional Catholic is getting stuck on the superficial (exterior) elements of our Catholic faith and worship. Another danger is getting caught up in the polemic battles with those who are out to destroy us. For this reason, each one of us needs to have a life centered on God through prayer. We love and fight for everything traditional because it protects the divine presence of God in our souls, our families and in our Church.
Here are 10 reminders why to be a traditional Catholics, (lest we forget);
1) To adore, love and serve God in the most dignified way possible in this life on earth. The primary reason we were created was to adore, love and serve God, in this life and in the life to come in heaven. This is what gives meaning to this life and our eternal life.
2) To defend and preserve the Catholic faith in its Ancient Liturgy and Teachings. Lex Orandi (How we pray.) protects Lex credendi (What we believe), that leads to Lex Vivendi (How we live our lives). And this is why we are giving our lives to defend and preserve what was passed on to us from before our time.
3) To obtain a personal union with God through the practice of this ancient Catholic faith. In living a orthodox life and praying in a manner that pleases God, graces are given to us to obtain our final goal, a loving union with God in this life and in the one to come.
4) To grow in holiness in our ordinary daily lives. No matter what we may believe and know about our Catholic faith, what is of paramount importance, is that it will effect our daily lives and how we live it in union with God.
5) To obtaining the graces necessary to fight the devil and our daily temptations. We live in a constant spiritual battle for our own souls, and those around us, against the forces of evil. God has given us the graces necessary through the traditional Latin Mass, Rites and prayers to avail ourselves with great power against the devil and his minions. The devil hates Latin and all that is sacred.
6) To defend Catholic Dogma against heresies and false worship. From the beginning of Christianity there has always been error introduced into the Church.St. Paul writes about the false apostles and those who are against truth in his epistles. And this has been part of the Church’s struggle down to today. We need to realize that heresy will have to be fought up to the last second before Jesus’ return in Glory.
7) To obtain the graces given by God that we need for the salvation of our eternal souls. At every Holy Mass, every Holy Communion, every confession, every time we go to adore Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, we receive divine graces. Every time we read the Bible, pray the Holy Rosary, we receive more graces (supernatural help from God) to not fall in sin and loose our souls forever in hell.
8) To avoid separation from God, which means eternal damnation and all of its horror. The greatest horror is to be eternally separated from our loving union with God. In living the traditional Catholic life there are many aids to help us on our way to avoid the pits of damnation and to find the spiritual ladders to climb out of the well, if for some terrible reason we may fall into the well of sin.
9) To help as many persons a possible to be saved through Jesus’ redeeming sacrifice. We love God, and we love our neighbor. Out of love, we want to share the tools that God has given to His Church, for salvation of souls. So by preserving and sharing traditional faith, we love our neighbors as ourselves and help them get to heaven.
10) To make it easy to be holy through the natural grandeur and beauty of the Latin Mass, churches, altars and art. The Holy Latin Mass is the “Most Beautiful Thing This Side of Heaven”. When the solemn High Mass is offered, in its beauty, it speaks beyond what human words can express. All over Europe, people from all over the world are awe struck at the grandeur and beauty of the Catholic churches and art. Millions of people wait hours in line just to be able to visit the traditional Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in Rome. Divine liturgy, art and music speak on their own.
There are many more reasons why to choose to be traditional Catholics. But these are some of the essential ones. So, this being stated, the next question is how do we live this traditional Catholic life every day.
1) Love God and Neighbor. Love of God helps us avoid what offends Him. Love of neighbor helps us grow in virtue and is indispensable. Every day we need to work on loving God and asking Him to help us love our family, our friends, strangers and our enemies.
2) Put God first in our personal lives, our family and our work. Priorities, priorities, priorities. Great people always know how to prioritize. We too need to be reminded every day to put God first. With God in the first place, the rest seems to fit together naturally.
3) Put prayer as the most important activity in your daily routine. Living in this fast pace life, we get caught up in the stream of rushing. We try to keep up with everything that needs to be done everyday. Prayer, then gets put off because it takes discipline and does not come naturally. It is much easier to just go along with the flow, than to put prayer first in our day and our lives. A day that is not started with prayer does not go that well. We always want to put prayer as the most important activity we can do every day. Fight the temptation to put it off till later. Later usually never comes.
4) Be around holy people who support, challenge us and council us on how to be holy. As we see in the Bible, Jesus gathered the apostles, disciples and friends around Him. It is wonderful to know that Jesus knows we need Him, and other holy people, to grow spiritually. We were not meant to be lone rangers. Let us be humbly open to other’s suggestions and constructive criticism, especially from holy priests and religious.
5) Read the Bible and other spiritual classics written by the saints. We have a great guide to help us on our way to heaven, called the Bible. All we have to do is sit down and open it and read it. We have thousands of older brothers and sisters (the saints) who have gone before us and cleared the path to heaven for us. We can walk in their foot prints or try to clear the path on our own. It is a lot safer and easier to follow their path than to re invent the wheel and highway over again. But it will take discipline to read their writings.
6) Attend the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as often as possible during the week. Graces and encouragement is available at the Holy Mass everyday. If we can only organize our day so that we can make time for this great help, we will be happier and holier for it.
7) Be attentive to the action of God in our ordinary lives as priests, religious and laity. Most of us are just ordinary people trying to be good. The daily life of St. Joseph and Mary in Nazareth was ordinary like ours. We learn from them that the ordinary life is the ordinary way to heaven. So we want to be extraordinary saints through the ordinary life God has given us.
8) Ask God for more faith and a deeper love for Him. Faith and love are supernatural virtues that comes from God that need to be developed. We all need more faith and love. When we have more faith and love, we are able to put our lives (with all its difficulties) in the hands of Our Loving God. So to grow in the virtue of faith, we need to exercise blind believing that God is behind everything that is happening to us (other than sinful actions). To grow in Love we daily ask for the grace to do things out of love and to put love into even the tiniest event and action of our daily routine.
9) Have gratitude for the graces already present in our lives. “The Attitude of Gratitude” is so important to keep us cheerful and steadfast on the way to holiness. Taking time to reflect on what God has done, is doing and will continue to do in the future, helps us in the dry times of our spiritual lives.
10) Have a hatred for sin and anything that would in the slightest way offend God. Loving what God loves and hating what God hates, is a help to stay close to Him. It is very salutary to meditate on the terrible consequences of sin in our past and in the world around us right now. Sin is poison, a virus that kills the body and the soul.
God has been so good to help us live holy, happy and healthy lives. We are so blessed to have these divine treasures in the traditional Catholic Church. Let us protect them and share them with all those who have good will.
We traditionalists know who is in charge after all; God. And for that reason we can relax about all that is going on in the Church and in the world. So, we enjoy each day, loving, adoring, praising and thanking God for His love, protection and goodness.
The original author of this blog passed away in July of 2016. RIP Father Carota.
