Das Leben ist Kurz

Zwölf Bagatellen

by Martin Mosebach

(Rowohlt, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 2016)

In the United States Martin Mosebach, the liturgical essayist, is well known. Martin Mosebach, the novelist and writer, is far less known. After all, it was only two years ago that one of his novels, What Was Before, was translated into English for the first time. Mosebach has now published Life is Short: Twelve Bagatelles, a collection of his shorter and shortest fiction. If it were only translated, it would be for the American reader an ideal concentrated introduction to the style of Martin Mosebach.

Life is Short gathers previously published short works. In general, I would categorize them as “prose poems” rather than short stories. Rather than presenting a narrative or character, the miniatures in Life is Short describe an object, capture a mood or a moment – often in an indirect, indeterminate way. One thinks of such remote antecedents as Arthur Machen’s Ornaments in Jade (1897) or J-K Huysmans’ Drageoir aux Épices (1874). Mosebach’s style, however, if “poetic” in the use of sound and images, is more restrained and precise. And, as in Mosebach’s novels, here and there is satire and even comedy.

As to things, Life is Short offers numerous descriptions of objects as diverse as a bicycle, a pigeon egg or the wreckage of an (apparently) abandoned barber shop. Mosebach endows mere things with new significance, even (in the case of the bicycle) a life of their own. As William Carlos Williams put it:

“So much depends upon a red wheelbarrow….”

But has not this kind of imagery always been a particular excellence of the author? One remembers so well the sacred cow in Das Beben, or the descriptions of a nightingale and later of the cockatoo in Was Davor Geschah.

These “bagatelles” also capture fleeting, uncertain and sometimes deceptive moments of life such as a boy’s exhilarating bicycle ride downhill after a hard day at school or the glimpse of a mysterious stranger sitting in a train compartment by a rider standing on the platform. If life is short, even more brief are the few moments that allow us insight into in it.

Some of the pieces in Life is Short assume the form of a short story. A tale of an artist and her friend discussing the components of a still life unexpectedly turns unsettling, even menacing. A visit to a dying deserted French town climaxing in a mysterious late night conversation leaves the story’s narrator perplexed as to what he as seen or imagined.

Yes, life is short – but art is long. If you want to get to know Mosebach the artist, this is a good place to start. But what of Mosebach the Catholic advocate, the inspiring writer on the liturgy? In the following brief final section of “Vinusse: Eight Wine Labels and a Prologue,” the author does more explicitly present liturgical and theological themes in an anecdote that takes place in his own backyard, near Frankfurt. It’s a tale that also leaves us with a kind of commentary on the meaning of this little book.

The Wine of Sacrifice

The biretta of the monsignor hung from the hat rack in the foyer. Its glowing crimson pompom was the only sign of baroque pleasure in color in the severe scholar’s dwelling. The old theologian regarded not as old-fashioned ballast, but as extraordinarily meaningful, that, as is often the case in the Rheingau, a vineyard was attached to the rectory. In this way a gift, the purity of which he well knew, entered the gothic chalice with which he offered the sacrifice.

The walls of his study were covered up to the ceiling with brown rows of books. The complete edition of Migne’s church fathers, bound in black-waxed linen, was ready at hand. The afternoon sun created small foci of light in the wine glasses that stood before us.

“This wine is the best that wine can become” said the cleric. “Firne-wine. Once upon a time these wines were desired but today nobody understands anything about them. People believe they have gone bad. And indeed they taste totally different. In many of my Rieslings the Firne sets in just after six or eight years, with others only after twelve or fifteen.  The wine grows darker and there develops a taste of fine Spanish snuff tobacco: a hint of turpentine, a breath of noble resin pervades the wine like a marriage, made only in the imagination, between wine and incense.  Maybe the wine, impatient and desperate at having to wait for its use in the Sacrifice, undertakes itself an attempt at auto-transubstantiation.

He hadn’t joked, but nevertheless smiled.

“Wine, after all, has been meant for sacrifice from the beginning. When wine was offered in the room of the last supper in Jerusalem that was done not out of the inspiration of the moment but in conscious remembrance of the mysterious, almost prehistoric priest-king Melchizedek, who had likewise made an offering of bread and wine. The matter of a sacrifice is not at our disposal. It is very true: visible things are not the final reality, but a kind of writing, by aid of which the invisible appears. An alphabet has letters that cannot be switched. Like all heresies, the idea arose early on that other substances could replace wine. Around 200 A.D. there was a sect in the Near East – the Aquarians – that in the Christian sacrifice used water instead of wine. To his everlasting fame, St. Cyprian of Carthage put the Aquarians’ madness in its place. Although my Firne – wine is only twenty years old, the Firne endows it with an ancient character. Therefore, with it I greet Saint Cyprian and his struggle against godless anti-sensuousness.”

(O Deutschland double a desperate name!
O world wide of its good!
But Gertrude, lily, and Luther, are two of a town,
Christ’s lily and beast of the waste wood:
From life’s dawn it is drawn down,
Abel is Cain’s brother and breasts they have sucked the same.)*

Cardinals Kasper, Marx, Lehmann and Schoenborn – all from the German – and “Greater German” – world, have been among the most vocal protagonists of Amoris Laetitia and of the process leading up to that document. They (rightly) see it as confirming and endorsing their own opinions and longstanding course of action. Their own surveys, however, have shown that these policies have brought Catholicism in the German lands to the brink of extinction. Truly it is The Wreck of the Deutschland! It does seem now that the catastrophe, which has overwhelmed the Church in Germany (and Western Europe) will spread worldwide. Continuing the nautical metaphor, Luc Perrin says:

The good ship Kasperic – like its ancestor the Titanic – is sinking: in the midst of exhilaration and slowly by reason of divine mercy but nevertheless it is taking on water. The music of the orchestra is lively and joyful; the dancers on the bridge are laughing and twirling but the water keeps rising. Yet in the radio room a sailor is tapping out “mayday, mayday, mayday.” There are vessels in the distance on the Catholic sea and lifeboats on the Kasperic. I am more focused on scrutinizing the ocean and launching the lifeboats than letting myself be swept away by the music of the ball…

Source “Le Forum Catholique.”

Yet this same German world has now provided us with the first clear responses to Amoris Laetitia. Athanasius Schneider (what a name!) an auxiliary bishop of German origin from Kazakhstan, has said the first clear episcopal words amid the universal cowardice of the Catholic hierarchy (to the extent, that is, that the bishops don’t actively support Amoris Laetitia)

Analyzing some of the affirmations of AL with an honest understanding, as they are in their own context, one finds that there is a difficulty in interpreting them according to the traditional doctrine of the Church. This fact is explained by the absence of concrete and explicit affirmation of the constant doctrine and practice of the Church, which is founded upon the Word of God and was reiterated by Pope John Paul II.

Text of Bishop Athanasius Schneider.

And now the German philosopher Robert Spaemann speaks out loud and bold:

Article 305 together with note 351, however, in which it is stated that faithful “in an objective situation of sin” “by reason of mitigating factors” can be admitted to the sacraments directly contradicts article 84 of Familiaris Consortio of John Paul II.

The concentration on the above-mentioned passages is, in my view, fully justified. You cannot expect, in a papal magisterial document, that people delight in beautiful passages and ignore decisive sentences, which change the teaching of the Church. There is here only a clear yes or no decision. Give communion or not give communion – there is no middle ground.

The consequences (of Amoris Laetitia – SC) can already be foreseen: destabilization and confusion from the Bishops’ conferences to the individual pastor in the jungle. A thrust for secularization and a further decline in the number of priests in many parts of the world are also be expected.

“Ein Bruch mit der Lehrtradition”

So if the push for Amoris Laetitia largely rests on the support of the higher clergy of the German-speaking countries, the first unambiguous criticism of it – at least from parties who cannot be ignored – also comes from this culture. Perhaps, God willing, the Germans, having very largely contributed to the present crisis, will be among the first to show us the way out of it?

(Thanks to Sandro Magister’s Chiesa and Settimo Cielo)

* Gerard Manley Hopkins, The Wreck of the Deutschland II 20. (Martin Luther and St. Gertrude were both born in Eisleben, Germany)

In a New Light

Giovanni Bellini’s St. Francis in the Desert

By Susannah Rutherglen and Charlotte Hale

(The Frick Collection, New York

In Association with D Giles Limited. London, 2015)

Not many visitors to the Frick Collection fail to notice a remarkable early Renaissance panel: St Francis in the Desert (also known as St. Francis in Ecstasy). The saint turns away from a dark hermitage at Mount La Verna where he has been engaged in meditation. He rises up to behold a divine light transforming both himself and the resplendent landscape that a spreads out before him. It seems that only through withdrawal and asceticism has St. Francis first been empowered to perceive the beauty of the world about him.

In a New Light is devoted entirely to this work, one of the masterpieces of Giovanni Bellini (1424/35 – 1516) the first supreme master of Venetian painting. The work was created in a society in which the contradictions of later ages had not yet emerged. In was a world in which theology, artistic technique, business and politics, public and private devotion were inextricably intertwined and “mutually enriching” (to apply a recent phrase). The patron was a leading man of the day – but not of the nobility. Both patron and artist belonged to the same lay confraternity. “The size of the panel, the care bestowed on its autograph design and the use of high quality ultramarine in the sky bespeak the work’s prestige and expense.”

It was a work intended for a private home or chapel. St. Francis in the Desert was:

“Among the most detailed of Bellini’s larger pictures, suggesting the work was intended to be scrutinized close up in an intimate setting rather than viewed from afar in a communal one. In the context of personal religious devotion, highly polished works….invite the spectator to embark on a meditational voyage, with the incidental discovery of minute details a reward for prolonged engagement and attentive viewing. (p. 123-24).

For the fact is that the incredible naturalist detail of mountains, towns, clothing plants and animals does not detract from the spiritual significance of this painting but reinforces it. The same can be said of the other innovations of Bellini: the use of oil paints, the depiction of the effects of natural light and of perspective and most obviously the creative departure from the usual iconography of the stigmatization of Saint Francis. Maureen Mullarkey has recently written  insightfully on the difference between the “sense of the sacred” embodied in Isenheimer Altar of Grunewald and the “technically” focused, realistic art of Titian. In the case of Giovanni Bellini, however, such a contradiction does not yet exist:

The perceptive treatment of natural light furthers an essential aim of Bellini’s art: to create an illusion so convincing as to draw the spectator into authentic visionary experience, the sense that divinity has become fully and actually present in this world. (p.105)

As the authors state, summarizing the art historian Millard Meiss:

The golden effulgence at the panels upper left hand corner was, (Meiss) argued, the symbol of an “unseen power” that miraculously sealed Francis’s flesh with the stigmata and transformed him into the likeness of God incarnate. Bellini’s spreading landscape supplied a true receptacle for this hallowed light, drawing all creation into ecstatic transformation.

Yet this painting depicts not the stigmatization of St. Francis, but his transfiguration. Francis has indeed become an Alter Christus – but only by first participating in Christ’s suffering. Indeed, In a New Light is almost a course in itself on Franciscan mystical theology of the late middle ages.

Other chapters in this book by the authors and several other contributors tell us all about the history and context of the painting. Its well-documented path from Venice to New York is laid out. The technical findings from the recent restoration are presented. By comparing St Francis in the Desert with other works by Bellini and his contemporaries the authors propose dating the work to 1476-78. And Michael F Cusato OFM traces the picture back to Franciscan vernacular texts that were circulating in Italy at the end of the 15^th century. He argues that the painting is not a direct product of the observant friars themselves but of the lay Franciscan environment of urban Venice.

So much can be learned from just one painting! In a New Light is a thorough guide. But before reading about this painting you should first visit the Frick Collection and contemplate St. Francis in the Desert for yourself…

Signs of the Holy One: Liturgy, Ritual and the Expression of the Sacred

By Uwe Michael Lang

(Ignatius Press, San Francisco 2015)

Fr. Uwe Michael Lang “of the Oratory” has given us a succinct, well written account of the movement to restore the presence of the sacred and the awareness of beauty within the Catholic Church. He provides those engaged in this effort a helpful guide to the relevant theory, tradition and authority.

In his first chapter the author offers an analysis of the “Sacred” and “Ritual.” Starting from the work of secular philosophers and sociologists, the “sacred’ and the “profane” emerge as categories. The sacred relates to the experience of the “numinous,” of the “wholly other.” (Rudolf Otto) That experience however is mediated and to some extent defined by ritual. Now ritual is “a culturally constructed system of symbolic communication.” (quoting Stanley J. Tambiah). A system of symbols – such as the mass – is far more than a series of texts to be read. “The solemn Mass consists of an integrated complex of words, music and movement, together with other visual and even olfactory elements.” (p. at 11)(quoting W.P. Mahrt). Without pretending to have exhausted in any way the richness of the ideas discussed in this chapter (and in the introduction), we can at a very minimum conclude that the Traditional Roman Rite is a classical example of the concept of “ritual.”

Fr. Lang then turns to recent Catholic theological challenges to these concepts. I found this chapter particularly helpful since I doubt I could ever have forced myself to wade through the works of Karl Rahner or Schillebeeckx. For highly influential schools of conciliar and post-conciliar theology in fact deny that any separate category of the Sacred can exist after the Incarnation. Post-incarnation, according to these thinkers, the entire world is sacred. It’s the kind of idealistic sleight-of-hand in which “what was sacred before” becomes positively harmful. Indeed, it seems to me hard to distinguish these theologies from outright atheism. The links of this line of thought to (emphatically non-theistic) avant-garde aesthetic theories are also obvious. In any case, it is obvious that behind many of the so-called “liturgical abuses” stand philosophical and theological tendencies that need to be engaged and refuted.

There follows an intriguing “excursus” discussing the issues raised by televising liturgies.

Fr. Lang then applies the analysis developed thus far in three subsequent chapters dedicated to Sacred Architecture, Sacred Art and Sacred Music.

Regarding sacred architecture, the illustrations of recent churches in this book reveal most concretely that different universes of art exist within the Church today. And the champions of architectural modernism advance ideas not at all dissimilar to the theological views Fr. Lang has previously outlined. In contrast, Fr. Lang attempts to develop some minimum “principles” for Sacred Architecture. They are:

1. Verticality – which points to the transcendence of God;
2. Orientation (the church must have a sense of direction);
3. Thresholds must exist (The entrance to the church must clearly mark off the interior from the exterior world; the sanctuary and the body of the church should be clearly offset from each other); and
4. “Iconoclasm is not a Christian option” (quoting Cardinal Ratzinger) – a purely abstract art is inappropriate.

Those even remotely familiar with recent “official” Catholic architecture can judge for themselves the extent to which these principles apply today. As noted, this book helpfully provides some telling illustrations of the problem.

On Sacred Art, Fr. Lang shows us the crisis of an art from which the very concept of beauty has disappeared. And he concludes that beauty can only be recovered if the liturgy is restored.

On Sacred Music, Fr. Lang shows the disastrous state of religious music, caught between the “two millstones” of “puritanic functionalism” – in which the Church’s musical heritage is replaced by congregational singing in the name of “Active Participation”– and the “functionalism of accommodation” in which music derived from contemporary jazz and pop makes its way into the sanctuary. In this analysis, as so often elsewhere in Signs of the Holy One, Fr. Lang proceeds from ideas of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. We can only regret how little of his perceptive thought Pope Benedict XVI was able to put into practice in his papacy.

Signs of the Holy One is written in a clear yet scholarly style. Fr. Lang carefully analyzes in each case the relevant authority. But that authority is not limited to the Vatican II and the post–conciliar popes but encompasses earlier councils and papal pronouncements. The works of the 18th century Benedict XIV are especially remarkable. Furthermore, abundant references and citations to leading authors on the topics covered making this work a gold mine for further research. The authors cited include some, like Jean Clair and Martin Mosebach, who bring a much more impassioned and poetic tone to Fr. Lang’s calm text.

I might have wished at times for more concrete and more contemporaneous examples to illustrate what the author discusses. I am not sure, for example, how effective it is to critique Beuron art, Augustus Pugin’s advocacy of the Gothic, the playing of Verdi’s music in a church in Sicily in 1860 (as depicted in a 1962 movie) and Wagner’s Parsifal. These critiques invite debate (how, for example, is Parsifal “blasphemous”?) and don’t we have much more recent, more vivid examples before us – such as the Copacabana Beach Mass of Pope Francis or the Venice exhibits of Cardinal Ravasi?

Fr. Lang frankly concedes his disappointment on the failure of the ideas advocated by this book to progress during the papacy of Benedict XVI. Under the new regime will they remain as just the personal whims of the “pope emeritus”? Fr. Lang correctly points to the continuing and developing search for the sacred and the beautiful in liturgy among younger Catholics as a basis for hope. Yet mending the “torn threads of Catholic ritual” “is a work that will need patience and perseverance and will not be completed in our lifetime”: (p.155) Those engaged in that work, however, will require not just commitment and energy but also knowledge and understanding. In this regard, with Signs of the Holy One Fr. Lang has provided them with an indispensable handbook.

As probably most of you know by now, Ross Douthat has written about “A Crisis of Conservative Catholicism.” And it’s remarkable that this article was first given as part of a lecture series sponsored by First Things and is now published on their website – the publication that is the very stronghold of Conservative Catholicism! And what I understand Mr. Douthat to be saying is equally astonishing:

The Conservative Catholic “story” (Mr. Douthat mercifully does not use the word “narrative”) is in a state of collapse. As our author says: “Our victories were not as permanent as we supposed, our arguments were less persuasive than we’d hoped, the Catholic center was not quite where we believed it to be, and our adversaries were not as foredoomed as we fondly wanted to believe.”

“Liberal Catholicism” (to use Mr. Douthat’s term) is immensely stronger than Conservative Catholics ever imagined. Key factors sustaining “Liberal Catholicism” are its message of reconciliation with the world and the complete religious indifference of the majority of the Catholic faithful.

“The papacy is not always the first bulwark of Orthodoxy.” “[T]here needs to be more discretion in the claims made for papal authority, more weight placed on the fullness of tradition rather than on the words of just one pope… .”

“Conservative Catholics need to come to terms with certain essential failures of Vatican II.” Indeed, that council may resemble (most closely?) the now forgotten Fifth Lateran Council – which also completely misread the “signs of the times.”

The foreseeable future of the Catholic Church will be not consolidation and recovery but ongoing internal conflict.

And much, much more. It sounds like a collection of observations made by Traditionalist Catholics over the years.

According to Mr Douthat, the crisis has been brought to a head primarily by the papacy of Francis but also by other recent developments such as the sexual abuse scandals of the Church, the  political “rout” of cultural conservatism in the US on issues like marriage, etc. What is necessary is a radical rethinking of the conservative view of the world and the Church. I agree – but would like to add a few observations and helpful suggestions.

First, Mr Douthat calls for a turn away from the unrestrained papalism that has been the hallmark of the Conservative Catholic movement. But his own thoughts in this regard – which still reflect the conservative Catholic worldview – need further clarification. How is it possible, for example, to reconcile the following statements?

(Pope) “Francis is not a theological liberal as we understand the term in the United States. He is too supernaturalist, too pietistic, too much of a moral conservative, too Catholic for that.”

“I firmly believe the proposals to admit remarried Catholics to communion without an annulment strike at the heart of how the Church has traditionally understood the sacraments and threaten to unravel… the Church’s entire teaching on sexual ethics.” (These proposals, of course, have enjoyed the support, both open and covert, of Francis).

Second, Mr Douthat still adheres to the idea of a mythical “center” equidistant from Traditionalism and progressivism. He then marvels how quickly this center has succumbed under Francis, when its remaining adherents find themselves on the “center – right.” But one main reason for this was that the hierarchy, the Vatican and the papacy – even that of John Paul II and Benedict – never subscribed to the doctrines of “conservative Catholicism” in the first place. This was especially evidenced by the episcopal nominations of these two pontiffs. Anyone aware of the laissez-faire appointment policy of these popes would not, like Mr. Douthat, be surprised that a college of cardinals allegedly “stacked” by John Paul II and Benedict elected Francis.

Third, the crack-up of the Conservative Catholic “story “ actually began much earlier than Mr. Douthat indicates. In the realm of liturgy – which, characteristically, Mr. Douthat does not even mention – the Vatican has consistently disappointed the “strict construction of the Novus Ordo” /”reform of the reform” doctrines of the Conservative Catholics since at least 1980. On the progressive side of the ledger, “abuses” like communion in the hand and altar girls were made almost universal with Vatican blessing. On the right, starting with the indults of the 1980’s and culminating in Summorum Pontificum, the Traditional Mass obtained once more a legal position in the Church – something the Conservative Catholics said would never happen. This saga of Conservative Catholic liturgical failure continues to the present day with the recent decree on the Holy Thursday Mandatum. Rubrics were changed to legalize the prior departure from liturgical norms by than no less a person than the Bishop of Rome. And when the decree was introduced it was made clear that further changes would likely be in the offing – also motivated by the deeds and statements of Francis.

Obviously, Mr Douthat will have an uphill battle in converting the Conservative Catholic movement to his views. For example, immediately following Mr. Douthat’s article in First Things we find George Weigel’s “What Really Happened at Synod 2015. ” Mr. Weigel summarizes the results of the synod as follows:

“But for all the confusions caused by ignorant, irresponsible, and ideologically skewed reporting on what happened in Rome, the recent synod reaffirmed the Gospel and the settled truths of Catholic faith and practice.”

That’s surely one of the most extraordinary analyses of last fall’s proceedings and their significance I have seen coming from any ideological quarter. To actually praise a synod of Catholic bishops for “reaffirming the gospel and the settled truths of Catholic faith” only reveals the depths of the problem Mr. Weigel does not want to acknowledge. And the role of Pope Francis before, during and after the synod is hardly mentioned except in a couple of references in which Mr. Weigel leaves the impression the pope was an opponent of the “Kasperite” party.

But, as they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day. We can only agree with Mr. Douthat’s summons to conservatives to undertake a more searching and honest review of the developments of the last century. For only truth and the understanding of reality can serve as a real basis for policies of action.

Monsignor Charles Pope has written an article that’s created quite a stir in the Traditionalist world. It’s been received with glee in some entirely expected quarters. It seems that, according to Monsignor, the movement for the Traditional Mass has plateaued – or is even fizzling out. The remedy has to be that Traditionalists have to commit to evangelization (which they apparently did not practice before?).

Now Monsignor Pope is a priest of the Washington DC Archdiocese and seems to have a keen interest in evangelization. He is an assiduous blogger – I believe he has gotten into trouble with the powers that be in his Archdiocese for at least one post. Moreover, he is archdiocesan coordinator for the Traditional Latin Mass – even though said Mass appears not to be a feature of the liturgical life of his own parish.

Let me say that I agree with our author’s basic point: Traditional Catholics need to do more evangelization. I have seen over and over again how a promising Traditional Mass has been organized at this or that parish. It remains an affair of a Low Mass on Sundays. And then, after a few years – or sometimes sooner – it is terminated by action of the original pastor or because of a personnel change in the rectory. It has been disappointing to see the failure of the Latin Mass to spread more widely. This is a topic that needs to be honestly addressed.

But having said that, I have to point out that Monsignor Pope’s article exhibits severe deficiencies.

First, some of the factual statements he makes – based on “anecdotal” evidence, to be sure – are grossly misleading. For starters, Monsignor Pope adduces as an example of Traditionalist failure a church that burned down in Chicago and which the Chicago Archdiocese does not wish to rebuild. But that parish was a relatively recent startup, was primarily a shrine and the headquarters of a religious order, and is located in an absolutely terrible neighborhood. So it was not relying on a congregation of 200 for its existence – a parish population that, considering the circumstances, might have represented an achievement. And, contrary to the impression given in this article, those 200 parishioners are not the sum of Traditionalist Catholics in the Chicago Archdiocese – there are a number of other very successful apostolates, at least one dating back several decades.

The author further claims that:

“One of our parishes generously offers a Solemn High Mass once a month on Sunday afternoon, a Mass that I myself have celebrated for over 25 years. But we have gone from seeing the church almost full, to two-thirds full, to now only about one-third full.”

This can hardly be taken as representative of the recent development of the celebration of the Traditional liturgy. I don’t recall any churches celebrating Traditional Masses 20-25 years ago that were ”almost full” except on unique and special occasions. I don’t recall “Solemn Masses” being regularly celebrated anywhere in the pre-Summorum Pontificum era – does Monsignor Pope mean a Missa Cantata? And I certainly don’t remember them “thriving” in 1995.

Now this site contains some data on the situation in the New York area that, although incomplete, goes beyond the merely anecdotal. Let us look at the number of parishes that celebrate the Traditional liturgy on Christmas. It’s a good place to start because such parishes exhibit a commitment to the Traditional Mass going beyond one celebration each week on Sunday – or even at more infrequent intervals.

2007 9 parishes (First year of Summorum Pontificum; without NJ)
2008 16
2009 16
2010 18
2011 22 (Christmas falls on a Sunday)
2012 16
2013 17
2014 20
2015 18

Now, according to this admittedly quite incomplete listing, the number of parishes celebrating Traditional Mass on Christmas has remained stable at 16-20 over the years. Traditional Masses at some churches cease to be celebrated for one reason or another – new ones take their place. But numbers do not tell the whole story – the quality of the celebrations has radically changed. On the one hand there are parishes that have perpetuated the situation found in 2005 under the Ecclesia Dei regime. They usually celebrate one Low Mass or Missa Cantata each week, have limited congregations and a local frame of reference. As such, they remain subject the whims of the pastor and of the diocese for their continued existence. One thinks of the masses that have been terminated in the recent past at the church of Our Saviour in New York or at the Basilica of St. John in Stamford.

On the other hand, there are several parishes – like Holy Innocents in New York or St. Mary’s Norwalk, CT – that have taken full advantage of Summorum Pontificum and have developed a life centered on the Traditional liturgy. These parishes aim to have the Traditional Mass celebrated on all major feasts or even daily – and vespers as well. The Solemn High liturgy with complete music and ceremonial is regularly celebrated. And the laity is involved in all aspects of the life of the parish – starting with the large contingent of acolytes serving at the Mass. These parishes are routinely full. And all this does indeed presuppose continued efforts at evangelization – though personal contact, on the Internet and in the various media.

Monsignor Pope seems to be unaware of this new liturgical life. He des not mention Summorum Pontificum. He takes as his model a parish “generously” offering a Traditional Mass at 2 PM on a Sunday afternoon. That may have been the paradigm in 1995 or 2005; it certainly is no longer the case.

Monsignor Pope also does not mention that the Traditional Mass still remains subject to severe restrictions – especially regarding the participation of the clergy. Seminarians regularly face retaliation for participating in Latin Masses; the same is true of members of religious orders. At this site we often are asked that certain people not be photographed or that the celebrants of liturgies not be named. And in one recent case the celebration of the liturgy itself remained secret! It is a phenomenon that has grown, not diminished in the last five years. And we are aware that on several occasions over the years those religious orders, which celebrate the Traditional liturgy, have been refused admittance to certain dioceses.

We could add that there are other reasons, not unique to Traditionalism, why the growth to the Traditional Mass may have stabilized. For Traditional Catholics are not as separate from the surrounding environment of the Church as they perhaps imagine themselves to be. If we look about us, the evangelization activity emanating from the average Catholic parish verges on the nonexistent. Traditional Catholics unfortunately only share this post-conciliar stupor and passivity. In the last couple of years we could add the demoralizing effect of what is going on in the Vatican. For when the “Bishop of Rome” is almost daily reported to be altering – or even denouncing as unchristian – rules on topics such as marriage and homosexuality that seemed immutable, negative consequences for the practice of the Catholic faith will surely follow. We already have “anecdotal” evidence of that.

One final aspect of this article – perhaps unintentional on the part of the author – is not a little disturbing to me. It is the contrast that emerges between a clergy, which deals with administration, money and numbers of “attendees,” and a Catholic laity – blissfully unaware of such constraints- that is devoted to schools, churches and even the beauty of the liturgy. There is an air of condescension for the Traditionalist “niche” players, whose number may not be large enough to attract the attention of the Archdiocese. I sense a return to the 1960’s model of clerical discourse, with “initiated” clergy enlightening a benighted laity attached to its old forms. And this totally uninspiring presentation of the priest primarily as a bureaucrat or administrator – although I believe it to be largely accurate – is itself exceedingly damaging to evangelization.

That many members of the Traditional Catholic milieu need to start more actively reaching out to their fellow Catholics and to the world at large I readily admit. We have seen that certain parishes have already shown the way. But, as this article also reveals, the lack of growth of the Traditionalist Catholic movement as well the decline of religious practice in of the Church as a whole have reasons that go far beyond a lack of commitment by the laity.

The Coup at Catholic University
(Ignatius Press, 2015)
By Peter M. Mitchell

Catholic University of America (“CUA”) is probably known to most of us as a certain educational institution in Washington for which the American Church still dares to take a scandalous annual collection nationwide  each year. A kind critic might describe CUA as “wildly inconsistent;” a crueler one as “third-rate.” Like the nearby Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, it is a monument to American Catholic failure: an inspired initiative that fell woefully short in the execution. Yet, at one period in the late 1960’s, Catholic University became the focal point of conflict and change in the Church in America:  a key stage of the transition from the Church of Spellman to that of the 1976 Call to Action conference. Fr. Peter Mitchell tells the story of these events from the initial “dissent” of Charles Curran to the complete capitulation of the board of the University and the seizure of effective control of the University by the progressive “dissenters”. All in the space of less than three years!

Fr. Mitchell takes us inside the action. We become privy to the consultations, discussions and private communications of the bishops and of the other main actors.  A story that had been known to some of us “from the outside” – from such works as Msgr. George Kelly’s The Battle for the American Church – is now set forth in full detail. And strangely enough, it’s an interesting even gripping read.  For the conflicts of the Conciliar Church that became manifest then have not been resolved at all – indeed they are more pressing than ever.

The blurb on the back of the book claims that it “suggests” the crisis of the 1960’s stems from the legalism and authoritarianism of the 1950’s. Now in fact The Coup at Catholic University does not spell out “root causes” that openly, preferring to let any such conclusions emerge from the narrative of the facts. But what it does reveal about the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church is devastating. For the administrators and bureaucrats who the Vatican had selected to be the “Fathers of the Faith” were hopelessly out of their depth when called to teach, make hard decisions and take stands unpopular with secular society.

This book tells an incredible story of epic episcopal failings. It starts with the initial confrontation of the board of directors of CUA (made up of bishops) with Fr. Charles Curran over his support of contraception – among his other disagreements with Catholic moral teaching. Yet Cardinal Krol – the leader of the Catholic University board – came up with the devious solution of simply not renewing Curran’s teaching contract without giving publicly any reasons. It was a scenario subsequently played out endlessly in the Church’s handling of clerical child abuse: problems would be swept under the rug in the hopes of avoiding  “scandal.”

Of course in the Curran case this approach backfired, allowing Fr. Curran to pose as a martyr of academic freedom, rallying the media and the University to his side. The result was complete victory for Curran: the board abjectly reversed its decision. Subsequently, when members of the faculty dissented from Humanae Vitae, the board ended up by delegating its authority to a faculty committee – which naturally upheld the position of the dissenters in all respects. The board then accepted this conclusion – in effect, surrendering total control of the University to the dissenters.

This saga, however, is not just of historical interest. The recent experiences at the Vatican Synod on the family have given these events a whole new relevance. Of course the protagonist of recent events is not a young theology professor but an old Bishop of Rome – but the resemblances, as depicted in the media, are remarkable. For Curran was described as “humble … who drove an old car without a muffler.” (p. 64) He was supposed to be “easygoing, approachable, “ “concerned with the living God rather than stereotypes.”(p. 60) And there are more substantive parallels. According to Cardinal Krol:

He (Charles Curran) says he is not advocating in practice a norm “different from the prevailing norm.” He says as a confessor and guide he must uphold the present teaching of the Church. But before he completes this section, he states: “There are times when contraception might be necessary for an individual couple. I have counseled couples along these lines.”… Throughout the book Father Curran artfully jumps from one to a[nother]contrary position. (p. 35)

Caardinal Krol found this position to be “some form of situationism.” (p.35) But how different is it from the current statements of the German episcopate and of the recent Roman synod of bishops? And how different is the conduct of that synod of bishops from that of the CUA board in the late 1960’s?

The rebellion over Curran was initially fought under the banner of “academic freedom.” Yet the same “dissenters” – one Curran had been reinstated – moved successfully to force  out of CUA those who had supported the CUA board of directors – with the concurrence of said board. We know from the student riots of that era – and the reenactment of these events in the last few months at Yale, Princeton and elsewhere by alleged “victims” of “racial insensitivity” – that “academic freedom” is the last thing these protestors want, then and now. Rather, what had happened in 1967-69 was the imposition of an outside ideology. This was indeed perceived by a minority at the time. Msgr. Eugene Kevane (a CUA dean) commented on a pro-dissenter “faculty working paper”:

This “obscure phrasing,” he said, made it possible to introduce a “secularized ideology . . . so that our Catholic University would actually lose the freedom to be itself.” . . . the American tradition of religious liberty recognized the right of a University to be committed to a particular religious identity as part of its exercise of freedom. To attempt to deny that identity in the name of an intolerant secularism was, said Kevane, inherently un-American. (p. 115)

(Msgr. Kevane was subsequently forced out.)

Finally, lurking in the background of all this was the Vatican of Pope Paul VI. Undoubtedly a factor in the reluctance of the CUA board to confront Fr. Curran squarely on the issue of contraception was the fact that Paul VI had convened a committee to study the issue –  to which Fr. Curran adroitly alluded in  defending of his actions. And when “dissent“ at CUA became general after Humane Vitae, Paul VI’s representative intervened with the board – in favor of the dissenters against papal authority.

Cardinal Garrone, prefect of the Sacred Congregation for Çatholic Education, wrote to Krol, urging him to prevail upon O’Boyle to avoid any further interference in the administration of CUA . . . Garrone’s letter indicated a clear desire on the part of the Holy See that the volatile situation on campus would calm down and that a certain stability and order would prevail at CUA and more generally within the Church in the entire United States. (pp. 240-41)

Thus, the cowardice of the CUA board finally received confirmation at the very highest level of authority.

The results of the battle at CUA, lost by the hierarchy almost without a fight, were catastrophic. So-called “dissent” achieved institutionalized dominance at Catholic higher education throughout the United States. Many years later, sanctions indeed were imposed upon Fr. Charles Curran – but by then it was far too little, too late. Predictably, the full adoption of American “academic freedom” by CUA and its “liberation” from the authority of its board of bishops have not at all raised the intellectual standing of this institution over the decades since 1969 – quite the contrary! Representative of many other institutes of Catholic higher eduction in the United States, CUA had abandoned its mission as a Catholic institution without attaining  in return any secular distinction.

(All page references are to The Coup at Catholic University)

by Father Richard Cipolla

When I recently read about Cardinal Sarah’s expressed hope that the Traditional Offertory Prayers would be included in the next edition of the Roman Missal, I was very happy, because this is exactly what is needed, if what Pope Benedict XVI asked for with respect to the two Forms of the Roman rite, namely that there would be a mutual enrichment of each Form, becomes something real. Because of the prejudicial opposition of the current liturgical establishment, this has not happened. They would argue that it is forbidden to mix rites. One cannot use prayers from the Melkite rite in the Roman rite. And they are correct. But there is nothing that says that one cannot use prayers from the Extraordinary Form in the Ordinary Form. There is no such prohibition to be found anywhere, because our situation is sui generis.

In this light, I am proposing a list of ways that the Ordinary Form of the Mass can be enriched by elements of the Extraordinary Form. While this is addressed mainly to the many young priests who are open to importance of the Extraordinary Form and want to learn it, these suggestions pertain to all priests who love the Mass and want to celebrate the Novus Ordo in continuity with what has come before. The basic premise underlying these suggestions is that what was sacred then is sacred now.

1. Say the vesting prayers before Mass. They are a wonderful way to remind the priest what he is about to do: to offer the re-presentation of the Sacrifice of Calvary and his own unworthiness to do so.

2. Always wear the amice. The amice is optional is the Novus Ordo but is required if whatever the priest is wearing at the neck is exposed. Of course, this is not enforced. The amice is the “helmet of salvation” and should always be worn at Mass.

3. Wear the maniple at every Mass. The maniple was never abolished as a vestment. It is just not mentioned. To wear this ancient vestment that is a symbol, among other things, of the servanthood of the priesthood is a wonderful reminder to both priests and laity of what the priesthood is all about.

4. If possible celebrate Mass oriented. This is the Traditional way to celebrate Mass. The people and priest face God TOGETHER in prayer. This is indeed difficult, given the current non-thinking acceptance of Mass celebrated versus populum. Read Father Uwe Lang’s definitive book     . There are severe obstacles to celebrating Mass with the traditional orientation, and in most circumstances it will be impossible due to the opposition (grounded in ignorance) of one’s superiors. If you are a pastor, before you make this move, you must educate your people in the historical and doctrinal issues that lie at the heart of celebrating Mass ad orientem.

The Ravine – the site of the martyrdoms.

As so often in the past, we came back again this year to the shrine of the North American martyrs in Auriesville, New York (west of Albany) for a personal “pilgrimage.” The time was right – it was the Saturday before the feast of St. Isaac Jogues on October 19. The fall weather and the foliage were magnificent. Only the temperature was distinctly on the chilly side – snow fell the next day. That’s the reason the “Pilgrimage for the Restoration” – which originally took place at this time – was pushed back to September.

(Above and below) A strange, sacred calm prevails here in the “offseason.” That is particularly so in the Ravine – the holiest part of the shrine – where Rene Goupil was martyred.

(above) The deserted second shrine church from the 1890’s. Only a handful of visitors could be found on the grounds of the Auriesville shrine this brilliant Saturday afternoon. The shrine “welcome center” and bookstore were “closed for the season.” Signs of neglect abound: outdoor stations of the cross have been knocked over here and there; a a large cross formed of pine trees created to advertise the shrine to the nearby thruway is sadly overgrown. Yet the brooding silence is welcome relief from the daily reports of the unfolding chaos of the synod in Rome.

(Above and below). After 120 years the Jesuits are giving up at the end of this year care of the Shrine of the North American Martyrs. “We’re moving on!” one of them proudly told us. Who will take over the spiritual care for the shrine is uncertain at this time. But this year money has become available – from the Knights of Columbus, among others – for some urgently needed repainting in the main church. And it seems that “master sculptor” Timothy P. Schmalz has obtained two or three big commissions.

(Below) It seems that the modest Victorian statuary of the past no longer suffices. The new funds are a mixed blessing indeed.

(Above) As the Catholic Church contracts, the Buddhists expand. Some years ago the Jesuits sold or leased the former Jesuit retreat house to a Chinese sect. They have expanded, constructing a pagoda-like tower peering over the shrine and a very Chinese-looking gate. The Buddhists have also gotten into disputes with the shrine over non-payment of utilities and the use of an access road (below – the “Father” is the Jesuit head of the shrine). What happens next is anyone’s guess. In the last few years, confronted with decreasing  numbers of visitors (and correspondingly diminishing donations), the Jesuits responded by restricting or excluding Traditionalist pilgrimages. We would hope the new management of  the Shrine of the North American Martyrs adopts a more Christian approach – and shows more energy in promoting what should be focal point of Catholicism on the East Coast.

The “Evangelical Advantage” by Rod Dreher in The American Conservative.

Citing an article by Leah Libresco discussing population growth and conversion trends:

In either model, Catholics wind up as one of the biggest losers even though their odds of retaining the children born into their faith are in the middle of the pack. They’re not a strong enough attractor of people leaving other faiths to replenish the people they lose, and so their share (of the US population) diminishes to the single digits.

Dreher:

These numbers startled me. I had no idea that the Catholic collapse was so dramatic, probably because the headspace I live in daily, online, is so strongly Catholic. Catholicism is on track to become such a minority religion in America that absent some dramatic shake-up, its numbers will in the future look like those of historically black Protestants today. Now, one in five Americans is Catholic; on current projections, only about one in ten will be in the future. (I can’t tell what the timeline is here; how far into the future does the analysis run?). Of course anything might happen to change this trajectory, which is why Leah says that you should look at the data not as a sign of what’s going to happen, but rather of what’s happening now.

And why is this?

Citing Philip Blosser:

For more than two generations now, we [Catholics] have been robbed of the fullness of Catholicism, which is our birthright. With a few thankful exceptions, our collective acquaintance with Scripture is piecemeal, our knowledge of tradition is pathetic, our hymns are embarrassing, our religious art is ugly, our churches look like UN meditation chapels, our ethics are slipshod, and our aesthetic and spiritual sensibilities are so far from being sublime that they almost look ridiculous. … For over two generations our faith formation has been shaped by a media culture that has portrayed our Church as a dinosaur that is either an impediment to social progress or simply irrelevant.

Dreher again:

My sense is that Rowland’s take on Benedict’s worldview tells us a lot of why Catholicism is failing in America (and highlights the tragedy of the brevity of the great man’s papacy). The leadership class of the Catholic Church — bishops, theologians, and so forth — “gave themselves up to modernity just as the real avant-garde was beginning to critique it. They came out of their bunkers with their hands in the air as the enemy was departing for a new battlefield. The Catholic elite of this generation was left to look effete and irrelevant.” In an effort to be relevant to modernity, they surrendered the Catholic distinctives that stood in contradiction to the currents of modernity. Thus while Catholic theology remains intact, the transmission of that theology in the lived experience of the parish — both in worship and in catechetics — has badly broken down. Paradoxically, in many parishes, a worshiper in this most sacramentally-oriented of the major American Christian churches may find himself having to hold on to the truths of his faith by exercising his will and his imagination to an extraordinary degree, because what he sees happening around him does not convey what the Church proclaims to be true.

And much more. It is an article everyone should read.