Traditionis Custodes, a collection of reactions
Last week, early in the morning, I had a text from a priest on the other side of the world that I found cryptic ("Well you came into tradition at just the right time."), not having checked the news before Mass. After breakfast, my husband came in from his study with the words, "I can't believe it."
By now you've read Traditionis Custodes, Pope Francis' Motu Proprio restricting the Traditional Latin Mass and essentially rescinding Pope Benedict XVI's Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum, allowing and affirming it.
And you've read the letter to the bishops accompanying it. declaring "the firm decision to abrogate all the norms, instructions, permissions and customs that precede the present motu proprio."
I just wanted to round up some of the best of what I've read so far on the topic. If you can only read a few things, here is what I recommend, basically in the order posted:
First, for an overview, a news story from my husband's site. An important point made in this story is the real possibility of harming ecumenical relations with the Orthodox.
Cardinal Mueller's strong analysis.
One may measure Pope Francis’ will to return to unity the deplored so-called “traditionalists” (i.e., those opposed to the Missal of Paul VI) against the degree of his determination to put an end to the innumerable “progressivist” abuses of the liturgy (renewed in accordance with Vatican II) that are tantamount to blasphemy. The paganization of the Catholic liturgy – which is in its essence nothing other than the worship of the One and Triune God – through the mythologization of nature, the idolatry of environment and climate, as well as the Pachamama spectacle, were rather counterproductive for the restoration and renewal of a dignified and orthodox liturgy reflective of the fulness of the Catholic faith.
Reflections on Pope Francis’s Motu Proprio “Traditionis Custodes” by Sebastian Morello. This is an important essay with a perspective that gets lost. The Church is a society (a word used by Pius XI, not only by political philosophers) and as such must be governed. If the primary mode of governance becomes revolution, disorder isn't limited to the structure of the institution, and in the case of the Church, it endangers souls.
Some questions, by John A. Monaco.
Similarly, Cardinal Burke asks questions and points to contradictions. (By the way, some mock Cardinal Burke, but he is a foremost expert on Canon law.)
Benedict XVI wished to overcome a schism with traditionalists, Francis will recreate it, by giving as a pretext, of course -- a Jesuit once, a Jesuit always -- that he intends in this way to reunite what he is separating. Vocations collapse with Vatican II. But the religious who preserve the Latin rite are not familiar with loss of interest, instead they fill up their seminaries. Pope Francis prefers churches that are empty with his ideas than full with those of Benedict XVI.
A reflection on the loss of tradition in general from Leila Miller.
A long video with Peter Kwasniewski, going through the letter line by line.
There are many more. The internet exploded with reasoned, spirited responses to this disastrous Motu Proprio. For a comprehensive round-up, see this article in the New Liturgical Movement, and this follow-up one.
UPDATE:
I did want to add this one from Cardinal Zen, former archbishop of Hong Kong. I am just pasting the English here:
Why do they see a problem where there is none and close their eyes to the problem, for which they are also responsible?
The concerns about a breezy document " against " the Tridentine Mass (see my blog June 12, 2021) have come true, and the blow was no less severe because it was foreseen, many tendentious generalizations in the documents hurt the hearts of many good people more than expected , which never gave the slightest cause for being suspected of not accepting the liturgical reform of the Council, much less not accepting the Council " Tout court ". They also remain active members in their parishes.
Personally, it was a bitter surprise that the “widespread” consultation did not reach me, a cardinal and already a member of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. During the years 2007-2009, then, I was bishop of Hong Kong and therefore responsible for the execution of the "Summorum Pontificum", and so far, a notorious supporter of the group.
Having known neither the questionnaire nor the questionnaire responses, I cannot judge, but only suspect that there was a lot of misunderstanding (or perhaps even manipulation) in the process.
From how I read the two documents I note (1) an incredible ease (or tendentiousness) in linking the desire to use the vetus ritus to the non-acceptance of the ritus novus and (2) in associating the non-acceptance of the liturgical reform (which often concerns the way in which it was carried out with its many grave abuses) with a total and profound rejection of the Council itself (for the proponents of this rejection the diversity of the rite of the Mass is only a small corollary, so much so that the concession regarding the rite did not reverse the schism).
The Vatican authorities should ask themselves (and perhaps even make a detailed investigation) about the reason for the persistence and perhaps (recent) aggravation of the second phenomenon.
The problem is not "which rite do people prefer?", But it is "why don't they go to Mass anymore?". From certain surveys it appears that half of the Christian people in Europe no longer believe in the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, they no longer believe in eternal life! Certainly we do not blame the liturgical reform, but it only means that the problem is much deeper, the question cannot be avoided: "Wasn't the formation of the faith missing?" "Wasn't the great work of the Council wasted?" Isn't the root of evil perhaps that attitude of believing that everything can now be changed? Is it not that attitude of believing that this Council cancels all precedents and that the Council of Trent is like the dirt accumulated on the fresco in the Sistine Chapel (as a "liturgist" in our diocese said)?
The Document obviously not only sees disturbances in the execution of the Summorun Pontificum, but considers the very existence of a parallel rite to be an evil. Paragraphs § 5 and § 6 of art 3, art. 4 and 5 do not clearly wish the death of the groups? But, even with this, cannot the anti-Ratzinger gentlemen of the Vatican be patient for the Tridentine Mass to die together with the death of Benedict XVI instead of humiliating the venerable Pope Emeritus in this way?