Desiderio Desideravi
Pope Francis’ Desire
On June 29, 2022, Pope Francis issued an Apostolic Letter on liturgical formation, entitled from the Latin Vulgate text of the Last Supper Desiderio desideravi—“With desire have I desired to eat this pasch with you before I suffer” (Lk. 22:15). It is in fact a series of reflections justifying to the laity the decision to revoke the permission for the traditional Latin Mass, given on July 16, 2021, and maintaining that the liturgical books of the liturgical reform of 1969 “are the unique expression of the lex orandi of the Roman Rite” and that “those who are rooted in the previous form of celebration…need to return to the Roman Rite promulgated by Saints Paul VI and John Paul II.” In Traditionis custodes he had declared that his reasons were based on the unity of the Church, affirming that traditional Catholics were causing a division, and in particular because he considered that the motive for the attachment to the traditional Mass “is a rejection not only of the liturgical reform, but of the Vatican Council II itself.” The recent Apostolic Letter pretends to justify his assertion that the traditional Mass is divisive and that it is a refusal of Vatican II.
Absence of Doctrine
In order to capture our good will, this document appeals repeatedly to the experience of the Eucharist, being an encounter with Christ alive, inseparable from the Incarnation, Passion, Death, Resurrection and Ascension of Christ, reminding us that every reception of communion is “that surrender to this love, that letting ourselves be drawn by him” (§8). However, the first observation that imposes itself is the total absence of Catholic doctrine concerning the Mass. Not only is the term Mass deliberately avoided, and replaced by the repeated “celebration of the Eucharist,” but there is no reference at all to the Church’s teaching in 65 long paragraphs that are supposed to explain the “beauty and truth of Christian celebration” (§1).
It is very revealing to compare this with the magisterial encyclical Mediator Dei of Pope Pius XII in 1947, condemning the excesses of the liturgical movement. Clarity comes with teaching Catholic truth, and this is what Pope Pius XII taught: “The august sacrifice of the altar, then, is no mere empty commemoration of the passion and death of Jesus Christ, but a true and proper act of sacrifice, whereby the High Priest by an unbloody immolation offers Himself a most acceptable Victim to the Eternal Father, as He did upon the Cross. It is one and the same Victim, the same Person now offers it by the ministry of His Passion, who then offered Himself on the Cross, the manner of offering alone being different” (§68). Pius XII goes on to point out that the Mass has the same four ends as the sacrifice of the Cross, namely giving praise and glory to His heavenly Father, duly giving thanks to God, expiation and propitiation for sins and impetration of blessings and graces (§71-74). These are the truths of our Faith, upon which all considerations concerning Mass must be based, and upon which our unity at the Holy Sacrifice is founded. But there is no mention of any of them in Francis’ Apostolic Letter of desire. Instead there is constant reference to the vague, nebulous, experiential, “existential” (§41) encounter with Christ. Clearly this is not based upon the objective truths of Faith contained in the Mass and so it is nothing but an immanent experience, which St. Pius X called modernism.
Accusations Against Traditional Catholics
Instead, Pope Francis makes two gratuitous accusations against those attached to the traditional rite of Mass. To do so he quotes from his own encyclical on the New Evangelization of November 24, 2013. It is consequently important to understand what he means by the New Evangelization. It can be summarized in simple terms. The New Evangelization is a natural sharing process that builds up a certain human sense of oneness and community on a purely natural level. It stands in opposition to the direct teaching of supernaturally revealed truth. It is a human phenomenon of dialogue, corresponding to a man’s desire to have others share his ideas. It is consequently not specifically Catholic, but something that any other religious or non-religious person can practice. Used as a means of spreading the Faith, it is consequently and necessarily a form of naturalism.
Gnosticism
Pope Francis’s first accusation against those opposed to the New Evangelization is that they fall into Gnosticism. Gnosticism is an ancient heresy from the early centuries of the Church, which pretends to a hidden, esoteric knowledge, only accessible to a few chosen souls, which knowledge itself is what constitutes sanctification. It is directly opposed to Catholic doctrine on many points, not the least of which is its denial of divine revelation and grace. This accusation is directed against traditional Catholics because they supposedly consider themselves to have some special knowledge and to have fallen into “the prison of self-referencing, nourished by one’s own reasoning and one’s own feeling” (§19). He further accuses us of “subjectivism” “imprisoned in his or her own thoughts and feelings” (§17), because we will not accept the official line of the revolution in the Church. Elsewhere he calls it “individualism” (§28). However, the falsehood of this accusation escapes no-one who has studied the positions of those attached to the true Mass. They are not motivated by personal hidden knowledge, or by personal reasoning or feelings, or the possession of some higher knowledge. Traditional Catholics are quite simply faithful to the catechism, to what the Church has always taught and done. They refuse the liberalism and naturalism repeatedly condemned by the Church’s Magisterium. This is entirely as a result of fidelity to the Church, that we adhere to that which is truly Catholic. It has nothing to do with the heresies of Gnosticism.
Neo-Pelagianism
The second accusation is that of neo-Pelagianism. Pelagianism was a heresy of the fifth century which denied the necessity of grace and maintained that man could be pleasing to God by his own efforts. This accusation is directed against traditional Catholics, because we are supposedly intoxicated “with the presumption of a salvation earned through our own efforts” (§20). Participation in the true liturgy is considered to be “our own achievement” (Ib.), that is “by a scrupulous observance of the rubrics” and the search for “a ritual aesthetic” (§22), which allegedly makes one incapable of symbolic action and understanding (§28). However, it is exactly the contrary. It is precisely because we understand what the Mass is, and what its prayers and its actions symbolize, that we pay so much attention to them. Indeed, obedience to the rubrics and the desire to make the Holy Sacrifice as beautiful as possible, by the ceremonies, chants, vestments, etc. is not naturalism at all, but the expression of our love for the supernatural. It is not a depending upon our own efforts, for there is no pretence to be justified by a scrupulous observance of the rubrics. It is only the grace of God which can sanctify, but it is given principally by the Mass and the sacraments, which is why we surround them with so much honor. Our fidelity to the rules of the Church and to all her teachings is ultimately because of our understanding of our littleness, sinfulness, and our need for grace and for the supernatural. The accusation of Neo-Pelagianism is preposterous.
Sense of Mystery Evacuated
Pope Francis’ response to one of the “chief accusations against the liturgical reform” is the consequence. The accusation, he says, is this, and we all agree: “It is said that the sense of mystery has been removed from the celebration” (§25). Here is his response: “If the reform has eliminated that vague sense of mystery, then more than a cause for accusations it is to its credit” (Ib.). He is, therefore, proud of the fact that there is no longer a sense of mystery in the Novus Ordo.
But, if we remember our catechism we will know that “a supernatural mystery is a truth which we cannot fully understand, but which we firmly believe because we have God’s word for it.” The Mass contains many such mysteries, not just transubstantiation, but that Christ can continue to offer up the same sacrifice on our altars as on the cross, making it present for us as if we were at the foot of the Cross, and that His Precious Blood is vicariously offered on our behalf, and is thus efficacious in expiating our sins and obtaining the many graces that we need but do not deserve. It is for this reason that we proclaim in the words of consecration of the Precious Blood in the traditional Mass that this sacrifice is “the mystery of Faith.” By mystery we mean precisely the revealed truths that are expressed in the prayers, gestures and ceremonies of the traditional Mass. And this is precisely what is missing in the new Mass. It is replaced, Pope Francis himself claims, by “astonishment or wonder” (Ib.) at God’s plan, “not some sort of being overcome in the face of an obscure reality or a mysterious rite.” The mystery of our supernatural Faith is thus evacuated from the prosaic New Mass, and it is no wonder that Mysterium fidei was eliminated from the words of consecration of the Precious Blood in the New Mass to adapt to its naturalism.
Vatican II and the Liturgical Reform
Pope Francis’ most profound, and at the same time most contentious, observations are found in §31, in which he speaks of the relationship between the Second Vatican Council and the New Mass. There he explains the reason for his affirmation that the liturgical books of the new rites “are the unique expression of the lex orandi of the Roman rite.” These are his words: “It would be trivial to read the tension, unfortunately present around the celebration, as a simple divergence between different tastes concerning a particular ritual form. The problematic is primarily ecclesiological. I do not see how it is possible to say that one recognizes the validity of the Council—though it amazes me that a Catholic might presume to do so—and at the same time not accept the liturgical reform born out of Sacrosanctum Concilium, a document that expresses the reality of the Liturgy intimately joined to the vision of Church so admirably described in Lumen Gentium.”
This observation, which identifies the real cause of the rupture in the Church, has been contested by some conservatives, who love the traditional Mass but affirm that they have no difficulties with the teachings of the Second Vatican Council. They observe that the Fathers who voted the Vatican II decree on the Liturgy (SC) had no idea to what degree Archbishop Bugnini would years later destroy the traditional rite of Mass, and they consequently conclude that the liturgical reform was not the consequence of Vatican II at all. For this they quote, amongst others, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, who as Cardinal Ratzinger in 1976 affirmed: “The problem of the new Missal lies in the fact that it breaks away from this continuous history, which has always gone on before and after Pius V, and creates a thoroughly new book (albeit from old material), the appearance of which is accompanied by a type of prohibition of what has gone before, which is quite unheard of in the history of ecclesiastical law and liturgy. I can say with certainty from my knowledge of the Council debate and from rereading the speeches of the Council Fathers delivered at that time that this was not intended” (Letter to Prof. Waldstein); and again in 1986 “In part it is simply a fact that the Council was pushed aside.” Cardinal Stickler is also quoted as affirming in 1997: “I found that the final edition of the new Roman Missal (1969) in many ways did not correspond to the conciliar texts that I knew so well, and that it contained much that broadened, changed or even was directly contrary to the Council’s provisions.” However, if it is certainly true that SC does not contain all the errors and abuses of the New Mass as it is now celebrated, it does not follow that the principles upon which it is based are not clearly found in Vatican II, and also in SC.
The New Mass, Issue of Vatican II
Such authors propose to deny that the New Mass is the unique expression of the lex orandi of the Roman rite, by contradicting the Pope’s affirmation that it is the fruit of Vatican II. To the contrary, they should be affirming that it is precisely because it is the fruit of Vatican II that it cannot possibly be the expression of the Church’s Catholic prayer. They have missed the entire point of the Pope’s affirmation. He does not say that the liturgical reform is entirely in the document on the liturgy (SC), but that the new vision of the Church described by the Vatican II document on the Church (LG) is the essential determining factor, along with SC, for a liturgical reform being in conformity with the decrees of Vatican II, taken as a whole. In this he is absolutely correct, affirming as he does “the intimate bond between this first of the Council’s constitutions (SC) and all the others” (§61).
The New Ecclesiology
For the redefinition of the Church is the essential novelty of Vatican II, as John Paul II admitted in the promulgation of the 1983 Code of Canon Law. The notion of the Church has been enlarged and expanded to include all of humanity, which is why the Church of Christ is no longer said to be identical to the Catholic Church, but to subsist in it (LG §8), and why there is no longer such a thing as a false religion, since all benefit from religious liberty, even when they do not search for the truth (DH §2), and all have “many elements of sanctification and truth” (LG §8). The obligation of ecumenism is the consequence (UR). The reason is given by the document on the Church and the modern world, Gaudium et spes, which clearly defines the new Humanism, root of the new Ecclesiology, in §22: “It is only in the mystery of the Word made flesh, that the mystery of man truly becomes clear” for Christ “fully reveals man to himself… for, by his Incarnation, he the son of God has in a certain way united himself with each man.” Christ’s mission, therefore, and that of the Church, are on a purely natural level. Their mission is to give that vague spiritual life to all men that makes them truly men, a mission that has nothing of the supernatural. Hence the definition of the Church given in LG §2: “The Church, in Christ, is in the nature of sacrament—a sign and instrument, that is, of communion with God and of unity among all men.” The Catholic Church is but a symbol and a sign of what unites all men, and brings all men by themselves into some vague communion with God—that is she promotes the dignity of human nature, their common brotherhood—nothing more or less.
This humanism becomes a personalism when it places all of the focus on the individual person and his relationships, while making abstraction from God, His grace, the common good, and the necessity of the Catholic Faith. Thus Pope Francis affirms in this very apostolic letter that the encounter of the liturgy makes “a human being become fully human,” that is “open to a full relationship with God, with creation, and with one’s brothers and sisters” (§33). The New Mass operates, therefore, on a simply human level, and is not specifically supernatural. It was Pope Paul VI himself who admitted that this new humanism was the driving force behind Vatican II, when he concluded the Council by a discourse on Dec 7, 1965 stating: “Secular humanism, revealing itself in its horrible anti-clerical reality has, in a certain sense, defied the Council. The religion of the God who became man has met the religion (for such it is) of man who makes himself God. And what happened? Was there a clash, a battle, a condemnation? There could have been but there was none… You, modern humanists, who renounce the transcendence of the highest realities, recognized for it (the Council) this merit and accept to acknowledge our new humanism, for we also, more than anybody else, have the worship of man.”
Humanism Applied to the Liturgy
There can consequently be no doubt about it that Vatican II called for a transformation of the Church according to this new humanism, which is essentially naturalistic, making abstraction from the supernatural order of grace. Yet, it is the special function of the Catholic Church to provide grace through the Mass and the sacraments. It is in this light that Sacrosanctum concilium must be interpreted when it requests that full and active participation by all the people must “be considered before all else,” that is before the doctrine of the Mass (SC §15). It is likewise with this understanding that the elements of the Liturgy which are not of divine institution “not only may be changed, but ought to be changed with the passage of time” (§21). Now the only divine elements of the Mass are contained in the words of institution, which are little more than the matter and form of the sacrament. Everything else comes from the Apostles and from the Church over the centuries. This necessity of innovation demanded by SC denies ecclesiastical tradition, which hands down to us the prayers and ceremonies of the Mass, the sacraments, and our devotions, which express our Catholic Faith so profoundly. To change everything that is not divine, in the light of the new notion of the Church, is to remove that which is specifically Catholic, and makes it acceptable to humanity as a whole, and to non-Catholics in particular, as was done with the New Mass when six protestant observers were asked to help frame it. It is this denial of that which is specifically Catholic, of the Church’s bimillenial Tradition, perfectly expressing the Faith, which shows how the New Mass comes from SC, in the light of the other teachings of Vatican II.
SC likewise orders that “the liturgical books are to be revised as soon as possible” (§25), that there be a wider use of the vernacular (§36,2 & 54), that “the rite of the Mass is to be revised”(§50), that “communion under both kinds be granted” (§55), that it no longer be the Mass of the catechumens and the Mass of the faithful but “the liturgy of the word and the eucharistic liturgy” (§56), that concelebration be allowed with a new rite (§57, 58). These novelties are all to be interpreted according to the new ecclesiology, regardless of what precautions may have been inserted into the document to obtain the votes of the conservative bishops.
New Mass = Paschal Mystery
This is, indeed, the New Mass in its making. That which is specifically Catholic and supernatural is systematically either obscured or gently evacuated. It is no longer the true propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of the world, but the “repeated experience of the Paschal Mystery,” as Pope Francis repeats ad nauseam (§36). The term Paschal Mystery has a precise theological signification. By it is meant the manifestation of God’s love for us in the person and resurrection of Christ. It is not the Redemption properly speaking, for it does not include any sacrifice for the sins of the world. This is considered to be an outdated medieval concept affirming that God’s justice must be propitiated, thus denying, they say, the love of God. The Paschal Mystery is simply a reminder of God’s goodness which Christ gave to us when He rose from the dead. This is easily understood from a purely natural perspective, for Christ by rising from the dead and showing his power has opened the path to man truly knowing himself, and accessing his high dignity. It is no longer a question of the supernatural dignity acquired by the Redemption, by which we participate in the life of God Himself. It is man’s natural dignity, his human freedom, which is emphasized. This is the whole focus of the New Mass and why it is that it destroys the Catholic Faith, which is a supernatural infused gift from God by which we believe all that God has revealed, and in particular our need for Redemption, not what man thinks, believes or likes about himself. This is confirmed by this very Apostolic Letter, which speaks repeatedly of the ¨importance of presiding¨ (§55), which presiding by the priest has taken the place of offering the sacrifice, never mentioned. Here again is what Pope Francis has to say on this: ¨It is the celebration itself that educates the priest to this level and quality of presiding. It is not, I repeat, a mental adhesion¨ (§60). What he means is that it is not a profession of Faith with the mind, but a shared experience. This is a purely natural understanding of the Liturgy. It is the New Mass, a celebration presided over by a priest, and not a sacrifice.
If Pope Francis believes that the New Mass is born of Vatican II, because it follows the new ecclesiology introduced by Vatican II, then he is indeed correct. The New Mass was created for the specific purpose of expressing the new notion of the Church, humanist and naturalist as it is. And it is precisely for this reason that it cannot possibly be any expression at all of the prayer of the Catholic Church and must be entirely rejected. The lex orandi of the Roman rite is the traditional Mass, just as in the Eastern rites it is their own traditional liturgy. This is how the Church has always prayed, and anybody who denies it falls under the condemnation of the seventh ecumenical Council, the Second Council of Nicea, which in 787 declared against the heresy of iconoclasm: “Those, therefore, who dare… to spurn according to wretched heretics the ecclesiastical traditions and to invent anything novel, or to reject anything from these things which have been consecrated by the Church… or to invent perversely and cunningly for the overthrow of anyone of the legitimate traditions of the Catholic Church… we order… to be excommunicated” (DB 304).
Validity of Vatican II
In his Apostolic Letter, Pope Francis accuses traditional Catholics of refusing to accept “the validity of the Council.” This confusing accusation calls for clarification. No traditional Catholic denies that Vatican II was convoked by Pope John XXIII and that the texts were approved by Pope Paul VI. If this is what is meant by validity, then the accusation is false. However, the question as to the value of the texts is altogether different. Vatican II did not use the charisma of infallibility of the extraordinary Magisterium, for it wanted to be pastoral and refused to make definitions and utter condemnations of the opposed errors, which are the necessary conditions for the Extraordinary Magisterium. Pope Paul VI himself clearly declared this just after the Council, on January 12, 1966, namely that the Council “had avoided proclaiming in an extraordinary manner dogmas having the mark of infallibility.” When it teaches what has always and everywhere been taught in the Church, then it teaches the truth by the Ordinary Magisterium, and every Catholic is bound to accept it. This is the meaning of the explanatory note attached to the Vatican II document on the Church by Archbishop Felici, Secretary General of the Council: “Taking into account conciliar practice and the pastoral purpose of the present council, the sacred synod defined as binding on the Church only those matters of faith and morals which is has expressly put forward as such.” That is the whole point. Nothing is put forth as binding in matters of faith and morals. Vatican II contains no definition of dogma, with the opposing anathema. Therefore, when it teaches novelties, philosophical ideas, humanism and ecumenism, there is no obligation whatsoever to believe, since these “teachings” are not teachings of the Catholic Church, but have been infiltrated into it. Consequently to accept the validity of the Council does not mean to accept all that it contains in its documents. Far from it.
In conclusion, our refusal of the New Mass, and our maintaining that the traditional Latin Mass as the unique expression of the lex orandi in the Roman rite are not questions of polemics, but of Faith. It is not a question of individualism, rejecting authority, causing divisions, but maintaining the Catholic unity that the modernists have blown apart by their humanism and their relativism, in the name of Vatican II. The more dictatorial and insistent Pope Francis becomes in his losing battle to have the true Mass destroyed, in the name of a fake humanist unity, the more determined we must be to maintain it in its integrity and to defend it, as the true Mass, the Mass of all time, the Catholic Mass, the expression of the supernatural inheritance that Christ left to the Church, in continuity with twenty centuries of Catholic doctrine and life.
TITLE IMAGE: Long Thiên, Pope Francis with the papal ferula used by John Paul II, March 28, 2016 (Wikimedia).
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