After the heterodox dissent group '
A Call to Action' organised a series of poorly attended meetings across the country,
I posted a blog exposing the misdirection and ignorance on their website.
I have been looking at the forum there (which is poorly designed and doesn't get much interest) and feeling increasingly frustrated that this group claim to be about dialogue and being an "effective sign of the Kingdom of God" whilst their website and dialogue seems to be about nurturing and promoting ideas and theories which clearly contradict Church teaching, and doing so within a closed circle of self-affirmation. It almost seems that any idea can gain a platform there, as long as it contradicts the Magisterium, from ordination of women to criticising the new translation of the Missal, from supporting dissident priests, to promoting ideas about human sexuality which contradict the teaching of the Church.
I found this post by the leader of this group in my own diocese, Tony Castle:
When I take Holy Communion to the sick and elderly they get confused; they cannot understand why the texts they are accustomed to are changed. I tried to read the prayers but they are so convoluted that the elderly can't follow, so I simplify so that they can understand.
I've never understood why there is almost an adoration of Latin. What is so special about that language? If you imagine yourself at the Last Supper and listen to the conversation, it is in Aramaic ! If you are a fly on the wall of one of Paul's house churches you will hear Greek!
Latin was a late comer to the scene....why Latin? Can anyone explain how it is superior to the Lord's own native language or the language of the NT writings ? I'd welcome an explanation about the sanctity of Latin.
I had to take up the challenge and so, with permission and some considerable help from
CCFather, I offered this explanation:
Tony Castle wrote: When I take Holy Communion to the sick and elderly they get confused; they cannot understand why the texts they are accustomed to are changed. I tried to read the prayers but they are so convoluted that the elderly can't follow, so I simplify so that they can understand.
Imagine how they must have felt when Novus Ordo was introduced! Tony, isn't it an abuse to change the texts?
Tony Castle wrote: I've never understood why there is almost an adoration of Latin. What is so special about that language? If you imagine yourself at the Last Supper and listen to the conversation, it is in Aramaic ! If you are a fly on the wall of one of Paul's house churches you will hear Greek!
You are correct here, the vernacular of the time was Aramaic, but it is also true that formal worship was conducted in Hebrew. Both Jesus and Paul would have worshipped in the synagogue and the Temple in Hebrew. It is also a fact that Jesus lived in what scholars term a 'tri-lingual melee' of Latin, Greek, and Aramaic. This is clearly evidence in Scripture (Jn 19:20 for example).
The use of another language for formal worship responds to a deep human need to express, in some way, the fact that in worshipping God formally, we are stepping aside from the day-to-day mundane world, and attempting to approach the numinous. I know this is somewhat divergent from some of your own theories. In personal, private prayer, of course, we can speak to God in very familiar terms: but formal public prayer needs something different. One of the other advantages of hieratic language is that its meaning doesn't change over time, unlike vernacular languages; so we do not run the risk of meaning being confused, or face the necessity of updating our texts regularly.
Tony Castle wrote: Latin was a late comer to the scene....why Latin? Can anyone explain how it is superior to the Lord's own native language or the language of the NT writings ? I'd welcome an explanation about the sanctity of Latin.
I can. I am a bit surprised that you don't know to be honest. In the Roman Church, until very recently, and for centuries, Latin was the hieratic language: a language set aside for formal worship, different from the vernacular. Indeed, even when Latin was still widely used as the universal language of scholars in Europe, Liturgical Latin (I understand) was different from Classical and Scholarly Latin; in ways analogous to the differences between the old-fashioned language of the Anglican’s traditional services and modern English. (It is interesting that many Anglicans still see the value of their hieratic patrimony).
So Latin could be considered holy precisely because it was the language set aside for formal worship.
Another reason is similar but different. Because Latin has, in fact, been the language of worship of the Western Church for so many centuries, it has been time-hallowed. Just as we might feel that Harvington Hall, or Tyburn, are in some sense holy because of their history, so Latin is holy because - well because St Thomas More, St Francis of Assisi, St Clare of Assisi, and indeed all the saints of the Western Church for several centuries, prayed in it.
That leads to a third related reason: due to that period of time, great prayers have been written in Latin, that are now part of our heritage: one thinks of the Pange Lingua, by Thomas Aquinas, or the older Pange Lingua by Venantius Fortunatus; or the Veni Creator Spritus by Rabanus Maurus, and the Veni Sancte Spiritus, by Pope Innocent lll (possibly). And so on...
Moreover, Latin is the language of the Church because of St Peter going to Rome, and establishing Rome as the centre of our Faith. This, surely, was not outside the Providence of God (any more than was Our Lord’s being born at a time when the Roman Empire enabled the promulgation of His Church rapidly through the western world). Latin is thus a link with our roots (as also is Greek, and I would make a similar case for the importance of retaining the little Greek that remains in our Liturgy: the Kyrie eleison and the Good Friday Reproaches).
In fact, Vatican II clearly teaches that Latin is to be retained: "the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites." (Sacrosanctum Concilium 36). The document goes on to state:
54. In Masses which are celebrated with the people, a suitable place may be allotted to their mother tongue. This is to apply in the first place to the readings and "the common prayer," but also, as local conditions may warrant, to those parts which pertain to the people, according to the norm laid down in Art. 36 of this Constitution.Nevertheless steps should be taken so that the faithful may also be able to say or to sing together in Latin those parts of the Ordinary of the Mass which pertain to them.
So, the Council did not abolish Latin in the liturgy. The Council permitted the vernacular in certain limited ways, but clearly understood that the fixed parts of the Mass would remain in Latin. Hope this helps!
I am not an EMHC myself, but my mother is and she pointed out that the new translation hardly affects the texts at all? Perhaps just in the Confiteor and even then, this is the Confiteor that used to be taught in the Catechism, which all these 'old people' would have learnt from.
So what is this? Dissent for dissent's sake? Or could it be accurate to conclude, from Mr. Castle's comments here that they are just poorly catechised and have never bothered to find out the answers to their questions?
Either way, it is disingenuous to purport to be Catholic, to stand for Catholicism or to represent the Catholic faith whilst holding views which are demonstrably schismatic.
My biggest problem with all this is the hubris. The idea that you know better than to be loyal to what the Church teaches. That you know better than all the scholars who have committed their lives to understanding this stuff. The model of obedience in faith we are given is Christ Jesus who accepted and obeyed His Father even unto death. The Church also holds up Mary.
The Virgin Mary most perfectly embodies the obedience of faith. By faith Mary welcomes the tidings and promise brought by the angel Gabriel, believing that "with God nothing will be impossible" and so giving her assent: "Behold I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be [done] to me according to your word." Elizabeth greeted her: "Blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her from the Lord." It is for this faith that all generations have called Mary blessed.
Throughout her life and until her last ordeal when Jesus her son died on the cross, Mary's faith never wavered. She never ceased to believe in the fulfilment of God's word. And so the Church venerates in Mary the purest realisation of faith (CCC 148,9).
To be a Catholic means to submit to the authority of the Pope. The Second Vatican Council teaches us:
"Among the principal duties of bishops the preaching of the Gospel occupies an eminent place. For bishops are preachers of the faith, who lead new disciples to Christ, and they are authentic teachers, that is, teachers endowed with the authority of Christ, who preach to the people committed to them the faith they must believe and put into practice.... Bishops, teaching in communion with the Roman Pontiff, are to be respected by all as witnesses to divine and Catholic truth. In matters of faith and morals, the bishops speak in the name of Christ and the faithful are to accept their teaching and adhere to it with a religious assent" (LG 25).
The magisterial function of bishops, then, is strictly tied to that of the Roman Pontiff. Therefore, the conciliar text goes on aptly to say:
"This religious submission of mind and will must be shown in a special way to the authentic Magisterium of the Roman Pontiff, even when he is not speaking ex cathedra; that is, it must be shown in such a way that his supreme Magisterium is acknowledged with reverence, the judgments made by him are sincerely adhered to, according to his manifest mind and will. His mind and will in the matter may be known either from the character of the documents, from his frequent repetition of the same doctrine, or from his manner of speaking" (LG 25).
This supreme authority of the papal Magisterium, to which the term apostolic has been traditionally reserved, even in its ordinary exercise derives from the institutional fact that the Roman Pontiff is the Successor of Peter in the mission of teaching, strengthening his brothers, and guaranteeing that the Church's preaching conforms to the "deposit of faith" of the apostles and of Christ's teaching. However, it also stems from the conviction, developed in Christian tradition, that the Bishop of Rome is also the heir to Peter in the charism of special assistance that Jesus promised him when he said: "I have prayed for you" (Lk 22:32). This signifies the Holy Spirit's continual help in the whole exercise of the teaching mission, meant to explain revealed truth and its consequences in human life.
For this reason the Second Vatican Council states that all the Pope's teaching should be listened to and accepted, even when it is not given ex cathedra but is proposed in the ordinary exercise of his Magisterium with the manifest intention of declaring, recalling and confirming the doctrine of faith. It is a consequence of the institutional fact and spiritual inheritance that completes the dimensions of the succession to Peter.
Schism is the refusal of submission to the Roman Pontiff or of communion with the members of the Church subject to him." [Code of Canon Law c.751]
When it comes to Catholics who are formally guilty of heresy, apostasy or schism, the Church applies the penalty of excommunication. The 1983 Code of Canon Law, repeating the sanctions of the earlier 1917 Code, states:
c. 1364
1. With due regard for can. 194, part 1, n. 2, an apostate from the faith, a heretic or a schismatic incurs automatic (latae sententiae) excommunication and if a cleric, he can also be punished by the penalties mentioned in can. 1336, part 1, nn. 1, 2, and 3.
2. If long lasting contumacy or the seriousness of scandal warrants it, other penalties can be added including dismissal from the clerical state. This canon is saying that once a person willingly repudiates Christ, embraces a heresy, knowing it to be contrary to divine and Catholic faith, or refuses submission to the Roman Pontiff (or communion with the members of the Church subject to him), by virtue of the law itself they are automatically excommunicated. No ecclesiastical act is necessary and no public notice.
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