Peter Kwasniewski is brilliant in this book at using the logic of the Vatican II reforms against those who have polluted the Church to demonstrate why the Traditional Latin Mass actually fulfills the reforms the Neo-Catholics have been trying to "discover" in the Novus Ordo far better than the Novus Ordo ever can or did. One of the things that has occurred since 1965 is that attendance of the Catholic faithful to Mass every Sunday has been in constant and drastic decline (Noble Beauty, 3). This was also around the time the changes to the Mass started to be implemented. Is this a sheer coincidence or is this an indicator that prayerful attendance to Mass is inherently connected to the type of worship that is occurring in Mass? One of the things the more "conservative" Neo-Catholic defenders of the Novus Ordo try to spit on is the concept of the lex credendi lex orandi. This, translated to English, means "law of belief, law of prayer". Fr. Casey has shown his consistent dismissal of this rule of law in the life of the Catholic as he relegates the changes of Mass and rites is not actually a matter of faith. Though there may be some argument when regarding fasting observances and what age to administer the sacrament of confirmation, when you are talking about fundamental changes to the Divine Liturgy, yes, the Divine Liturgy is a matter of faith. To dismiss this idea is to repudiate Catholicism. As we have shown from the introduction post in the comments made by the Byzantine Liturgist Nicholas Cabasilas.
Kwasniewski builds his defense of the Traditional Latin Mass's reimplementation being the root cause of what is drawing people back to the faith by citing numerous stories of people who have been attending the Novus Ordo, who now attend the Traditional Latin Mass, and can see the vast difference in reverence. Though these arguments are largely matters of personal experience, they touch on the fact that the Novus Ordo has created a dry religious environment for the Catholic faithful. There is a reason why people I know flock to the Traditional Latin Mass even after attending a Byzantine Liturgy in the morning. There is a reason why people would rather observe the beauty of the Traditional Latin Mass. Simply put, there comes a point in which the only real difference between Protestantism and Catholicism, if the Novus Ordo is the dominant Mass, is relegated to nothing more than paper. I remember walking around my old home in Arizona seeing a lot of these Novus Ordo parishes and they looked almost like megachurches. It felt weird thinking of them as Catholic parishes. One of my friends has commented about his own conversion, going into a Novus Ordo parish at first and wondering, "what's the difference" between this and Protestantism?
Religion is not a paper format but a relationship. Religion is a binding of oneself to God according to St. Augustine. Kwasniewski answers a common objection to the Traditional Mass, namely that it is irrelevant, we cannot see it, we cannot understand it. Kwasniewski's theology is based in simplicity but not in simplisticness. The Liturgy is like a window that shows us God. But like a window, if it is too transparent, it becomes invisible. The makers of the Novus Ordo demanded of us a transparent transparency where the window is so clean and clear that we run into it like a bird. There must be a level of opaqueness to come against (13-15), otherwise, we would not be able to come up face-to-face with God. In many ways, this shows the tensions of man with himself. The Novus Ordo becomes a form of self-worship when we look at the Mass in such a way that we try to grasp a reality tangible that we can understand. There is a lack of mystery in such a form of worship. It is formlessness.
"If, because of the way things are being done, one can see that the Mass is a sacrificial action in which our Lord and God is present for our adoration, that is a good simplicity─something that even the tiniest child can perceive and the oldest person still relish as the awe-inspiring wonder it is. If, on the other hand, one thinks Mass is a Bible study with a communion service, one might have been exposed to a bad simplification of it. Similarly, if you become immersed and a bit dizzy in the richness of the Mass as it invades all your senses and thoughts, that is a good complexity; no analysis could ever do it justice. But if there is a lot of disjointed and distracting stuff going on at Mass and you can hardly pray and cannot wait to get out, that is a bad complexity." (24-25)
How does this all relate to evangelism? Kwasniewski summarizes his position perfectly.
"The humanism, rationalism, archaeologism, utilitarianism, modernism, and other -isms on the basis of which the reformers worked in the sixties and seventies have yielded a liturgy inadequate to its own theological essence, unequal to its ascetical-mystical vocation, and estranged from its cultural inheritance." (27)
It is interesting to point out that the Latin word cultus from which our word "culture" derives from means worship. The modernistic mentality that took up the malformers was one of destruction of worship, an attack on prayer, and an assault on culture. The Traditional format of the Mass was the Catholic culture for ages. I think this is why we see the Byzantine Catholics starting to flourish as they adhere fast to their culture and recover their Eastern mentality. We have a worship that attracts Latins who have been left with a half-dead liturgy, if one could call it that. We need not sacrifice the West, but in adhering to our own culture, Greek Catholics have an important role to play in the recovery of the Church. We show the West that it is gravely important to cling to our cultural traditions. The West has been blessed with numerous ancient rites from English to Spanish to French to Celtic. This has led to the formulation of the its expression in the Traditional Latin Mass. The West needs to call its attention to its ancient traditions and abandon modernism in every way Greek Catholics must. Too many Greek Catholics think that the West is supposed to move Eastward in all of its formatting and by this, we fail to realize that the West is actually abandoning tradition altogether. The Church is universal. We are made of both East and West. We cannot allow the suicide of the West and pretend nothing is going on since they now have a "vernacular" liturgy. The West has done overtly heretical things to its liturgy. Or did we also abandon our tradition?
No comments:
Post a Comment