Edit: perhaps you have suffered through the music of David Haas and wondered why it was so bad? Part of the clue might be its inspiration. Jeff Ostrowski writes:
HE FIRST TIME I HEARD the name “David Haas” was on a CMAA website a few years ago. He was posting there, but when people started asking him questions he left—and never returned. (At least that’s my recollection.) It turns out David Haas is an extremely popular composer for the Ordinary Form. 1 I’ve never forgotten his last name because of its memorable spelling.
A Facebook Creed by David Haas was sent to me this morning. Much could be said about his edict—and haeresim sapiens comes to mind when I read statements like “ministry is not about believing in God”—but I don’t have time for a long post today.
http://www.ccwatershed.org/blog/2016/jan/26/David-Haas-Creed-About-Ministry/
89 comments:
The so-called music of David Haas and other Novus Ordo "composers" (Marty Haugen also comes to mind) have done more harm to souls and the sacred liturgy in my opinion than all the heresies of Karl Rahner and Hans Kueng put together (diabolical though these are in their own right), as they affect the pew laity more directly than Modernist theology, and on a frequent basis. Not only are their ditties bad music (juvenile, silly, totally lacking a sense of the sacred, and often unsingable---no wonder participation in typical Novus Ordo parishes is lethargic or non-existent), but they contain bad theology. The harm this type of music has caused the Catholic Faith is incalculable, just like the edifying effect of glorious chant, polyphony and truly sacred hymnody (ALL three important in their own right) made for some of the liturgical wonders of our Holy Religion and created a sound Catholic devotion in souls. Let us have truly sacred music in our traditional masses (leave the musical garbage for the Modernists who have created it and promote it), and let us sing what belongs to the Faithful with conviction and fervor both at mass and at devotions. Music is, as Shakespeare recognized, the language of the soul. RC
He and Fairy Bishop Barron no doubt get on famously.
P.S. Why is it that no-one is getting baptized anymore? Perhaps because the "Pope(s)", bishops, priests, music "ministers" etc. say everyone's saved! Hell is empty! Don't convert! So why come to hear the vacuous idiots pontificate? Surely we all get better things to do than worship a bunch of perverts, pedophiles and closet queens.
Vatican II wrecked the Church. Pope Francis is a living nightmare.
No, it upset your construct of the Church. There is a huge difference. Check out Lefebvre & Co.
A lot of the spores of V2 were ready present in the evils of nominalism, humanism, litirgical Jansenism, rationalism....
All of these, Tancred, are embedded in the Christology and ecclesiology upheld and taught by groups like the SSPX, FSSP and affiliates. The underlying philosophical and theological principles which support their views and apologetics are rooted in a decadent form of Scholasticism which does not have the intellectual rigor to withstand a sustained scrutiny.
It is the very same system of flawed reasoning which ultimately failed the Council of Trent. That Council, which promised much, ultimately baulked and took the coward's way out. It was this cowardice that Vat II attempted to reverse but it will take another Council to finish it off. The Synods of 2014-15 have prepared the way.
I suggest to you that the Conservative position on the Catholic spectrum does not have a single theologian or philosopher who has the intellectual gravitas or international credibility to hold his ground with an opponent on the other end of that spectrum.
You would say that because you're an evil Modernist.
I guess that according this heretic, Sean, the great Dietrich von Hildebrand (Pius XII said he would one day be a doctor of the Church), among many luminaries who opposed the rot which is Modernism, does not count. It is the Modernists who don't have any real intellectuals of any substance (look at the poisonous, bratty Hans Kueng and the much over-valued and evil Karl Rahner: poseurs and light weights). Of course not---for liberals reality and truth never count; it's all about their fetid fantasies and pseudo-intellectualism. Meinred
Tancred, it is precisely the very predictable response you have just made which has been roundly criticized recently by the conservative Catholic op ed writer for the NYT.
The Trads and Conservative have for so long clung to the corpse of a flawed philosophical and theological system which severed their roots in Thomism centuries ago because they could not abide the demanding rigorism of St Thomas thought.
They took the lazy, sloppy, comfortable way out by construction their own vision of the Catholic Church out of a set of comfortable syllogisms whose major premises cannot withstand close scrutiny.
I repeat the opinion that there is not one single competent theologian on the conservative side of Catholicism who can cut the intellectual mustard.
David Haas is the musical expression of the resourcement crew. Litirgical Jansenism combined with extreme laxism, a complete loser in the religion game, as exemplified by the mummies and lyches who show up at CTA conferences to gush about fatuous turds like Hans Kung.
And principal among the 'resourcement (sic) crew' were de Lubac, von Balthasar, Ratzinger, Kueng, Danielou, Chenu, Dulles, Rahner, Haering, Schillebeeckx and others, all men who studied their theology before 1958.
They did what Trent was too timid to do and its was they who put down the foundations for the reforms of Vatican II.
There has never been, is or will be anyone on the Conservative/Trad side of Catholicism who could come anywhere near them for knowledge of the Tradition and the intellectual authority to defend it.
The rest of your response is emotive venting.
Most of that is shit.
Most of them were condemned before 65. Shocked you didn't include the pantheistic Chardin.
But this is about the low-brow musical output that the work of these men either directly or indirectly foresaw, but you're too narcissistic to stay on point for long.
You're galloping around lost in your own circular argument Tancred.
Thomas Aquinas was condemned and banned for a couple of centuries. So what, did that make him wrong?
The onus is on you to follow through with your ambit dismissal of the 'resourcement (sic) crew.' You won't because you can't.
As for your dismissal of Haas, that to is a spray, a personal judgment which is entirely predictable but so what?
The genius of Christianity is that at its very heart is the Incarnation. This is expressed across the centuries and hundreds of cultures through inculturation. The grave Fathers of Trent had to face the fact that the Western Latin Mass was only one of dozens of different forms of the Eucharist celebrated in their different vernaculars and according to their proper cultural traditions, including the music.
One man's musical poisson is another man's poison. Get used to it.
What do your posts have to do with crap liturgical music?
Congratulations, Tancred, you have pulled off the perfect example of the circular argument: 'you're wrong because I'm right.'
Behind it though, is something even astonishing is the cultural imperialism you are trumpeting.
Your narrow, naïve Euro-centrism is to be pitied.
I'm just a but bored by deleting your mostly irrelevant comments, and senile editorializing going into the 100s, but it's also disturbing too.
Someone normal would have taken the hint months ago and gone off to buy some Saint Louis Jesuit crap, stuck in the 60s.
My unsolicited advice, Tancred, is to filter this moron pretending to know what the Church needed for centuries to be the Church. He is living proof of the rancid illogic of the heretics for the moment ascendant in the Church: leeches full of hot air and arrogance, pretending they know more than the saints, doctors and scholars who have always upheld Catholic Tradition. He is an evil agitator who should not be given a forum. Crush his ill-intentioned comments as if coming from a cockroach. Marcello
I wouldn't have thought a theological snob like Gaybriel would have fallen for a Catholic attempt at Puff the Magic Dragon, but there he is.
It actually gives me an idea.
"And principal among the 'resourcement (sic) crew' were de Lubac, von Balthasar, Ratzinger, Kueng, Danielou, Chenu, Dulles, Rahner, Haering, Schillebeeckx and others, all men who studied their theology before 1958."
That's certainly true.
But however problematic neo-Thomism had become in many places, the theology promoted by all of these Nouvelle Theologie theologians (yes, Ratzinger included, for the most part) ended up being a trainwreck of sloppy metaphysics.
"As for your dismissal of Haas, that to is a spray, a personal judgment which is entirely predictable but so what?"
The problem with Haas isn't that it's musically third rate knockoffs of Broadway, with little melodic connection to any traditional music of the Church, East or West.
No, the real problem is that its lyrics are theologically incongruent with Church teaching in many places, or at best, gauzily downplay them in favor of saccharine emotivism. And Haas's Creed here is flat out heterodox. It cannot be defended.
"Ministry is not about whether one believes in God." Good heavens.
"Thomas Aquinas was condemned and banned for a couple of centuries. So what, did that make him wrong?"
Uh, no actually, he wasn't. Tempier's 1277 condemnations never mentioned St Thomas by name, though it condemned a handful of thomistic propositions. Mostly it was aimed at radical Aristotelians and Averroists like Sigur of Brabant.
Aquinas wasn't condemned by the Holy See or any Council, however, and Dominicans zealously defended his work consistently after his death. Hard to see how he could be "banned" if he was canonized within 50 years of his death.
Athelstane,
The theologians who did the far reaching audit and assessment in the decades leading up to Vatican II did what the theologians at Trent baulked at namely to identity core beliefs of the Tradition and to separate them from the many theological schools and theories which have attempted explanations of the Tradition.
This was what 'ressoursement' was all about. It covered all of the disciplines involved in the service theology and philosophy offer in the work of understanding and teaching the Tradition. Thomas Aquinas was not excluded from this critical examination. The neo-Thomist critiques demonstrate quite clearly that Aquinas' theology and Aristotelian philosophical underpinnings were severely limited by the fact that they were heavily informed by the intellectual, political and cultural environment of the time. In other words, Thomas' authority, like all systems, is relative. Secondly, Thomistic thought and the whole of the Scholastic tradition is constructed on a set of assumptions which are established from within the system. It makes perfect sense and is unassailable in terms precisely in terms of those firs principles and the text books full of syllogisms which support them. Where all this becomes unravelled is when these limitations come under the serious challenge of other systems of thought which begin with different 'species impressae'.
This is where the great high priest of the Roman School, Reg Garrigou-Lagrange became unstuck, rattled and resentful. It was he who branded 'ressourcement' with the tag, 'la nouvelle theologie.' Reg did not have the capacity to think outside his closed world or to incarnate and articulate the core of the tradition in any other language or set of concepts outside of those of the Roman School. Its theology, like that of the schoolmen at Trent, and their followers still lurking around today, have snap frozen God and revelation in the icebergs of their own certitudes.
But I'm sure there's much more to discuss.
Athelstane,
Take a pause to examine what you wrote here:
"No, the real problem is that its lyrics are theologically incongruent with Church teaching in many places, or at best, gauzily downplay them in favor of saccharine emotivism. And Haas's Creed here is flat out heterodox. It cannot be defended."
If you are true to the rules of apologetic debate, you would no doubt accept the rules:
'Quod gratis asseritrur, gratis negatur' and
'de gustibus nil disputandum.'
Both apply to the relative value of your claim.
You claim that Haas' lyrics are 'not congruent with Church teaching in many places' without supporting this with details. What teachings are you talking about and in what pieces he wrote?
As for the claim that he's just echoing the popular Broadway musicals, he might be too but so are the rest of the composers, yes the greats, did not compose in a vacuum but in relation to the culture around them.
You might just read up on why the hymns of St Alphonsus Liquori became so popular and have had such a lasting effect especially in Europe.
In other words, prideful theologians want to interpolate their novelties under the presumption that the Fathers and Saints didn't know what they were doing. Evil Tubingen theologians accuse them of being stuck in their time, while they themselves are incapable of swing anything outside of the limits of their own rationalistic age, which they mistakenly regard as a pinnacle from which to judge the past.
Read Douthat on the inability of Conservatives to engage and sustain rational arguments. He cautions them precisely on what you have written.
Look at your all this personal and highly irrational reactivity Tancred: 'prideful theologians' 'interpolate', 'novelties,' under presumption,' 'Evil Tubingen theologians' etc.
This is not debate, its diatribe and it does nothing to further your concerns.
BTW, I find it intriguing that you didn't hang the epithet of 'theological snobbery' on Athelstane. How very selective you are Tancred.
You're the one who's deliberately irrational with your sophistries.
Ex: Comparing St. Thomas Aquuinas to Novelty Boutique Theologians like Balthazar, Danielou and Rahner. St. Thomas was never condemned by a pope.
Also, I doubt that Ross Douthat shares any of your views, especially not lately
Read what I wrote about Thomas Aquinas and the Ressourcement theologians. What they did with all the major theological sources which illuminate the Tradition was isolate the core from the time and culture conditioned theological explanations of core beliefs.
Thomas Aquinas is no exception as were the hermeneutical tools which were used before Pius XII in Divino afflante Spiritu approved the historical-critical exegetical methodologies.
And read again before you react and you will see that I did not say that Aquinas had been condemned by any Pope.
And do read Douthat.
But your resource center nouvelle scum were condemned.
Read what Douthat?
Your emotive blitz against the condemned 'nouvelle scum' were the very ones vindicated by Pope John XXIII who valued their scholarship and loyalty to the Church. All of them provided the theological foundation for Vatican II and its reforms. One of them became Pope Benedict XVI. He later taught in 'Porta Fidei' that Vatican II contained and continued to transmit the Magisterium of all previous Councils. You don't like hearing that do you, Tancred?
I just don't have any respect for people like you because you make so much stuff up, and rely on academic degrees, and arbitrary ecclesiastical approval to justify a host of things that are childishly anachronistic, and then accuse people who justifiably find fault with your ideas of being retrograde, stilted, manualiat what's its, and maybe it works where you can shit on your students and they can't fight back, or impose your BS on over privileged elderly bourgeois who want to be considered with it, but it doesn't wash with the continuity of the Church. Like all heretics you want to go back to a fabled time that never was to justify your vandalism today. So maybe you can browbeat those people, but you won't do it here.
By the way. I'm not kidding, I've deleted 100s of your posts. You're wasting your time here Baloney School.
Tancred you delete anything that challenges you to think outside your mono-dimensional cocoon-like world. It's the coward's way out of being accountable for your views and having to defend them.
Furthermore, you should be ashamed at the sheer intensity of your rage which is reflected in the vile language you are using here. It's an indication of a very angry person.
You advertise your site as 'polemical' but when someone comes along to question things you and your disciple say, you regress into unbecoming language and totally wrong conclusions about those who take you on.
You should be ashamed of the way you dishonestly ply your eldlerly notions. The fact that you will try to post dozens of times with the usual irrelevant, false contributions shows someone who surely has no shortage of free time to fritter away.
Lagrange has all you need to know.
You really should do, it would cure your vain penchant for novelty and the need to micromanage people's experience of reality.
Hello Sean,
'Quod gratis asseritrur, gratis negatur' and
'de gustibus nil disputandum.'
But they don't really apply, or not as broadly as you suggest. The Church has spoken on this, repeatedly, over the years. Even Sacrosanctum Concilium (notwithstanding being a problematic document in some ways) makes clear that Gregorian Chant "should be given pride of place in liturgical services." The only OTHER musical form SC even notes is polyphony. Naturally, of course, this became one more section of SC that ended up being a dead letter almost out of the gate.
What we *should* be doing is what the Church used to do traditionally (until hymnody and symphonic works began creeping in during the Baroque era) is chanting the propers. The propers are what we are given to pray! All of them. Hymnody should be a peripheral part of the music of the Mass.
You claim that Haas' lyrics are 'not congruent with Church teaching in many places' without supporting this with details. What teachings are you talking about and in what pieces he wrote?
What triggered my commentary was Haas's "Creed." If you've not read it, click the link. Almost every assertion within it is profoundly problematic. "Ministry is not about whether one believes in God." If you don't believe in God, you have no business doing ministry. Full stop. But you could certainly do well to be ministered to yourself.
Hello again Sean,
Responding to your other comment here....
The theologians who did the far reaching audit and assessment in the decades leading up to Vatican II did what the theologians at Trent baulked at namely to identity core beliefs of the Tradition and to separate them from the many theological schools and theories which have attempted explanations of the Tradition.
There's a lot to unpack here in what you're asserting again, and I confess I don't fully understand what it is you're trying to get at.
But I do think that you misunderstand what Trent was about. It wasn't Trent's job to adjudicate between different major schools of theology, nor did it attempt to do so, beyond a general endorsement of thomistic theology, broadly speaking. It's job was a) to address major points of theological dispute that emerged during the Reformation, especially regarding the operation of grace, sacraments, and ecclesiology; and b) to enact urgently needed disciplinary reforms in the life of the Church. And it accomplished these two objectives. As it was, both were major undertakings, especially in the context of the political complications that made it difficult for the Council to hold session at all.
Thomas Aquinas was not excluded from this critical examination.
Not only was St. Thomas not excluded; he was *rejected* for the most part by the new theologians. It wasn't just arid stripes of neo-Thomism that were being tossed over the side. At most, occasional fusions were attempted with Kantian and personalist philosophies, though they were ones in which Thomism was the distinctly junior partner in the fusion. The result was that too often, modern philosophies with presuppositions incompatible with Catholic self-understanding came to predominate, as they do now in so many academic theology departments. The renewed examination and dissemination of the patristic works, especially in Sources Chretiennes, certainly *did* have real value; but that project did not have to throw Thomism and Schoalisticism generally out of the tub to make room for the Fathers. But that was what was done, in effect - at least when they weren't willfully misunderstanding St. Thomas, as de Lubac unfortunately does in Surnaturel.
And here's the irony: Thomism is blasted by modern theologians (and by you, it seems) for being a closed system unable to engage with other metaphysics or epistemologies, for not taking history seriously. But really, how much value do, say, Rahnerian schools of thought really have to convey to outsiders, even in knocked down pastoral forms (of the sort that have dominated catechesis and instruction in most of the Church)? What renewal of Church life and spirituality have they presided over? How much are non-Catholic theologies or modern philosophies even engaging them today, really? What are *their* fruits?
There *is a good traditionalist critique to be made of inherent dangers (temptations?) of scholasticism generally, a critique that takes seriously the Magisterium going back to the Church Fathers - and you can find a mostly insightful version of it in Geoffrey Hull's The Banished Heart. But where Hull is pointing his compass *isn't* toward the terrain occupied by post transcendental Thomist or more radical theological schools. because they're generally even *more* part of what's killing off the faith than the most arid and unreflective forms of Scholasticism.
[Garrigou-Lagrange]did not have the capacity to think outside his closed world or to incarnate and articulate the core of the tradition in any other language or set of concepts outside of those of the Roman School.
I think this is a quite unfair caricature of Garrigou-Lagrange. I have to wonder, with all due respect, just how much of his work you have really read or engaged.
Sean,
One more thing...
And read again before you react and you will see that I did not say that Aquinas had been condemned by any Pope.
You addressed this to Tancred, but I feel like it's a response to my previous comment. What you said was this: "Thomas Aquinas was condemned and banned for a couple of centuries. So what, did that make him wrong?"
In fact, as I noted, Aquinas was not condemned by name; only a handful of propositions were condemned, and only by the Bishop of Paris. In fact, his work was steadily defended and increasingly embraced by the Church - so much so that the cause for his canonization gained steam within a generation, and culminated in his being raised to the altars within 50 years. Men who are condemned and their works banned can't enjoy such honor.
But too often, Tempier's condemnations are taken by progressive theologians as a defense - "Hey, if Aquinas could be condemned by the Church, condemnations of theologians today can't be taken seriously, either." No matter how much violence that stance does to the facts on both ends of the equation. There's simply no way that, say, Tielhard de Chardin can be reconciled with even a broad reading of the Magisterium on many points.
Athelstane,
Let's begin with the 9.50 AM response.
Firstly, the matter of Sacrosanctum Concilium as 'problematic.' It was the first of Vat II's documents to be promulgated and this indicates in my mind how important a priority it was. Like all the documents of any Council, it represents a compromise. It validates at one and the same time, validations of what was (the traditional Latin liturgies of the Roman Rite) and what should be allowed to develop, namely the vernacular liturgy and local authority in determining how that should happen. Every major theological view represented at the Council is reflected in its documents. The ongoing task of working with the ensuing compromises continues. You cite SC as proclaiming that pride of place should be given to Gregorian Chant. It was, in places where that made sense. It never made sense in China, Japan, or Africa in all its diversity or in the Anglo speaking world. To continue insisting on giving it pride of place displayed a level of naïve, and arrogant Euro-centrism which was being rejected on a monumental scale throughout the world in the years following WWII.
SC equally affirmed the right of local Churches to celebrate the Mass in the vernacular and for national bishops groups to determine liturgical rules and textual translations.
There was compromise then, but even more to the point and an extremely painful one for conservative and traditional Catholics, when the 2800 bishops of Vat II went home, they effectively sidelined the Latin Mass and associated music and opted for the vernacular form of the Latin Rite and music which was contemporary and local.
Athelstane, you can argue about your personal 'shoulds' in relation to the use of Gregorian chant as much as you like but it will never happen. So too with Latin. It has undergone its fourth death. It's finished.
As for 'quod gratis asseritur, gratis negaur,' you have not justified your assertion that Haas' lyrics are not congruent with the Church's teachings. I have read Haas' creed, the onus is on you to substantiate your allegations. So, what precise Church teachings are you referring to and where does Haas part company from them?
There is more to discuss.
Athelstane.
You are well and truly off the mark when you assert that Thomas Aquinas was almost completely ignored by the theologians of the ressourcement prior to Vatican II. They didn't ignore his teaching, they extracted from his doctrine that which is of perennial value (his core insights) and identified the less valuable elements. One of these was the excessive and uncritical use of the Scholastic method of investigation via the mechanistic Q & As in Aristotelian discourse and argument.
Those who resisted the ressourcement (done by scholars quite independently of one another), were theologians such as Garrigou-Lagrange OP and others of the Roman School. BTW, I think that your think along the lines of the Roman system.
Instead of pushing their own theological investigations (to do this is the task of theology) they dug in, vilified their colleagues and declare a decayed, pre-critical version of Thomism to be timeless and immutable. They virtually transformed Thomas into the Word Incarnate and the Summma into the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.
Athelstane, you mention the wisdom in going back to the magisterium of the Fathers of the Church. Good, but what Fathers, on what matters over what doctrinal controversies.
I wait on your detailed clarification.
1. It was, in places where that made sense.
Where would that be, though?
Where, in the entire Catholic world, was Gregorian chant still being employed in the Mass in (to pick a year) 1975?
2. It never made sense in China, Japan, or Africa in all its diversity or in the Anglo speaking world.
With all due respect, Cardinal Zen of Hong Kong, in his remarks yesterday, would seem to disagree with this point of view: "“The Mass offered in this fashion nourished our faith, nourished our vocation. And so many people in my native town Shanghai were fortified … by receiving the faith from this Mass, and during the time of persecution, they were so strong."
Culture does help shape liturgy. But the idea that the old Roman Rite (and its various uses and related Rites, also all obliterated by the 60's revolution) was culturally bound in a way incomprehensible to non_European cultures is belied by centuries of fruitful celebration around the world, from Manila to Milan to Mozambique to Mexico City. It also concedes far too much to radical liberation theologies, who inevitably reduce all premises to the material - and to identity groups.
3. SC equally affirmed the right of local Churches to celebrate the Mass in the vernacular and for national bishops groups to determine liturgical rules and textual translations.
The permission clearly envisioned a limited use of vernacular, at least as an option (a mistake, in my opinion, FWIW, though far from the worst one in SC); in its own words, it did not contemplate the eradication of Latin from the Mass. Paul VI and his Consilium plainly decided to disregard this dictum; but you cannot pretend that there is warrant in the *Council* for going with a completely vernacular liturgy. If that had been the intent, that section would never have been approved by the Council Fathers (whatever most later acceded to under obedience to the Pope).
4. you have not justified your assertion that Haas' lyrics are not congruent with the Church's teachings
Let us begin by having you defend the one I cited: "Ministry is not about whether one believes in God." If you think that belief in God is not ABSOLUTELY essential to Catholic ministry, I would very much like to hear your defense of that. Because on its face, I cannot find any way to defend that statement.
5. Lastly, to repeat my point above: Why are we not chanting the propers in every Mass?
Athelstane: My advice to you is to ignore this moron, Sean,who pretends to know so much but is in fact an ignoramus. His venomous little mission on this blog is to poison the faith of its readers (as his was poisoned in who-knows what seminary or "Catholic" school). He clearly hates the perennial philosophy of the great Aquinas---repeatedly declared the Angelic Doctor, the Common Doctor, for his precise and lucid exposition of the harmony between philosophy and orthodox theology. He repeats the tired canard about the scholastic manuals, as if that were what the "Summa" boiled down to. Sean pretends to know what the Vatican II fathers intended and parrots the modernist line about "inculturation" (read the debasement of the Catholic liturgy according to the whims and base taste of local modernists, who typically worship ugliness---a good sign of who they serve). The web master should find a way to block this enemy of the Catholic Faith from publishing his poison here and you, Athelstane, do not assume learning or good will on the part of this common enemy and shallow poseur. Meinrad
It's the job of a theologian to "push his own investigations"?
As to vilification, I'm not sure how legitimate criticism of an erroneous position is vilification, but it seems to me that mischaracterizing scholasticism as "uncreative, moribund, sterile" and so on, while it doesn't actually explain scholasticism, does fall under the category of vilification.
Once again, Gaybriel refuses to answer some legitimate questions put to him about his poor reading of Vatican II.
That sort of dishonesty is exactly why I've deleted his comments on site in the past.
Fellow Catholics:
It seems necessary to clarify what people like "Sean" mean by the much-touted, intellectual-sounding word "ressourcement." It is key to understanding them. These Modernists normally mean returning to sources (as the French origin of the word indicates). It sounds very apostolic, pure Christianity without (according to their "lights") the unnecessary, harmful baggage acquired by the Church over centuries---particularly since the closing of the Patristic Period. What these deceitful heretics really mean is what the great Pius XII condemned in his magisterial encyclical on the liturgy "Mediator Dei" by archeologism: a pseudo-antiquarian unearthing of supposedly apostolic practices which are in fact without any historical pedigree or apostolic lineage. Among these "treasures" dug up by these arrogant "saviors" of Holy Church are such nefarious practices as mass versus populum (facing the people) and communion in the hand---in actuality frauds as "apostolic practices." Their ressourcement is nothing but a devious pretext for their plan of re-making the Church in their image and likeness; in fact, a perfidious insult to Holy Mother Church which implies that She has strayed from the right path of apostolic antiquity and purity over many centuries. Did we not hear the same slander from the mouths and pens of Protestants since 1517? We certainly have, as their world views and hatred of the Catholic Church are the same. At first, these revolutionaries limited themselves to the destruction of the sacred liturgy; now, under their leader Francis, they are proceeding to do the same with Catholic doctrine and morality: divorce could be "discovered" and female deacons and homosexual unions could be discovered in the the life and practice of apostolic times if we would only shed those awful Thomistic manuals and pick up an egalitarian instrument like the guitar rather than the aristocratic organ It is a strategy truly hatched in Hell. And they do it all counting on a clergy and laity they consider too stupid and/or lazy to know better, incapable of research or going to authentic church history. Sadly, with many comfortable Catholics they have succeeded. To imply that the Church has strayed from sound liturgy and doctrine because of accretions and ossification is a condemned heresy in the great St. Pius X's encyclical "Pascendi Dominici Gregis" of 1907. The saintly pope knew these impostors for what they were and are: malevolent liars hiding when it suits them and coming out with their arms of destruction at other times. They are cowards and heretics and their program is neither apostolic, pure, unencumbered by false accretions or a "return to sources." It is a front to change the religion and the worship of Catholics, with nothing to do with apostolic tradition or praxis. Make no mistake about it: nothing is sacred to them (except their arrogant opinions and Stalinist tactics)---not the liturgy, not Catholic morality, not Catholic doctrine, not Holy Scripture, not salutary devotions, not sacred Tradition, not the memory of the saints an martyrs, not sacred art, not the innumerable sacrifices over two millenia of ordinary Catholics. All must yield to their luciferian pride and the lunacy of their thinking they can improve on the Faith that yielded the greatest civilization the world has ever seen (they deride it as "Euro-centric," as the vermin Sean repeatedly does in the comments above). Let us, then, pray for their conversion, for the strengthening of our own faith and virtue, and for the will to fight them to the last breath of our being if necessary. Nothing short of this is worthy of those who bear the glorious name of Catholic, of those faithful to the Redeemer Whose Holy Name we bless. RC
Yet, based on his comments here, would likely be quick to accuse you of ad hominem, H8, bitterness, anger, etc if you were to criticize Hans Küng's numerous apostatical exhortations.
Of course the old canards about Latin:
So too with Latin. It has undergone its fourth death. It's finished.
How often have I heard this old chestnut while attending "catholic" schools in the heady days of the JPII Pontificate and the first Asisi conference. The hubris of modern intellectuals that virtually everyone who preceded us was an ignoramus to one degree or another. Just remember in the end, the revolution typically eats its own.
Of course "Latin is finished" ... ipse dixit, our betters have told us so.
This assertion is patently false even if one were to speak to a competent Classics professor at Secular U who has an appreciation of Virgil's original hexameter Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris... over ANY English translation.
I urge the admins of this blog to keep these comments open and NOT block this person unless he/she descends into profanity or the callow ridicule and florid sophistry of a certain caustic, corpulent gas bag blogger at an amateur theology site frequently criticized here. Of course this is your site (which I enjoy reading) and I'm not attempting to tell you how to run it, just expressing my silly opinions.
Greetings once again, Athelstane. Thank you for your courteous and considered responses. Allow me to take up in this post the substance of your first two points.
A. With all due respect, Cardinal Zen of Hong Kong, in his remarks yesterday, would seem to disagree with this point of view: "“The Mass offered in this fashion nourished our faith, nourished our vocation. And so many people in my native town Shanghai were fortified … by receiving the faith from this Mass, and during the time of persecution, they were so strong."
S. Cardinal Zen would say that wouldn’t he? He was, after all, addressing a group of people who are still at home with the Mass of 1570. In his youth in Maoist China, that was the only Mass he and his people knew but he did not go on to say that the Ordinary Form was detrimental to faith, devotion to the Eucharist or a factor impeding ‘our vocation.’ As Bishop of Hong Kong, I imagine that the overwhelming number of public Masses he celebrated over the years have been in either Cantonese or English.
A. Culture does help shape liturgy. But the idea that the old Roman Rite (and its various uses and related Rites, also all obliterated by the 60's revolution) was culturally bound in a way incomprehensible to non_European cultures is belied by centuries of fruitful celebration around the world, from Manila to Milan to Mozambique to Mexico City. It also concedes far too much to radical liberation theologies, who inevitably reduce all premises to the material - and to identity groups.
S. The 2800 bishops at Vatican II decided it was time to introduce the vernacular form of the Roman Rite. Even Council peritus, Fr Professor Joseph Ratzinger applauded the provisions in SC and subsequent reforms writing that there was a huge chasm between priest and people at Mass and the only thing they shared in common was the fact that they were in the same building at the same time: the priest ‘said Mass’ while the people ‘said the Rosary.’ He also said that the Mass had become the victim of rubrics and operetta theatrics leaving the congregation like onlookers at an elaborate clerical performance. The 2800 Council bishops clearly thought the same, archived the Latin Mass and chose the vernacular.
When you assert that there is nothing in SC to suggest that the bishops were authorised to move ahead with the vernacular, you clearly show little knowledge of how Council’s work and how its collective will, teaching and mandates continue after the formal end of the Council.
The bishops at Vatican II were the authors of its documents so they knew the intentions of the authors and both could and did continue to interpret both the Council and its (their) intentions.
If you need proof of this principle of on-going interpretation and application of Conciliar teaching, study the practice of St Charles Borromeo after Trent. The Council decreed that synods be held annually in all dioceses. Borromeo, who was a reforming bishop, took this very seriously. He took up the express will of Trent for bishops and their synods to interpret and implement the teachings of the Council. The 'Acta Ecclesiae Mediolanensis' were regularly published in the decades after the Trent and became the bench mark for other bishops and diocesan synods to interpret the Council and apply its intentions to their own situations. This is exactly what the bishops of Vat II did. They were the creators of the documents of that Council and they were the authentic magisterium which interpreted them afterwards. This is a point Conservatives and Traditionalists don’t, I think, understand at all.
I shall take up you last two points in the next post.
Thank you for such a stimulating conversation.
Athelstane, the conversation continues.
3. A. SC equally affirmed the right of local Churches to celebrate the Mass in the vernacular and for national bishops groups to determine liturgical rules and textual translations.
The permission clearly envisioned a limited use of vernacular, at least as an option (a mistake, in my opinion, FWIW, though far from the worst one in SC); in its own words, it did not contemplate the eradication of Latin from the Mass. Paul VI and his Consilium plainly decided to disregard this dictum; but you cannot pretend that there is warrant in the *Council* for going with a completely vernacular liturgy. If that had been the intent, that section would never have been approved by the Council Fathers (whatever most later acceded to under obedience to the Pope).
My response here largely builds on what I had to say at the end of the last post. An Ecumenical Council is the highest teaching authority in the Catholic Church and it is free not only to rule on what is core doctrine and what is not, it also has the authority to determine what language best describes the body of the Church’s beliefs. At Trent, the Council largely preferred the theological concepts favoured by the Dominican, Augustinian and Franciscan schools of deductive Scholastic thought and argumentation over the more liberal and culturally dynamic schools of Christian Humanism.
When the Second Vatican Council commenced, many German, French, Dutch and Belgian bishops along with their periti rejected from the first session what they regarded as the pre-packaged theological schemata of the Roman school prepared by the Curia. The major criticism was that the Curia had determined that the work of the Council would be largely focused on updating some of the provisions of Canon Law. Pope John XXIII supported the bishops who had a much larger vision of reform who quickly presented their own schemata which were based on the Ressourcement theological work of the three or four previous decades. It should be kept in mind that these all of the council bishops had emerged from the standard seminary system established by Borromeo in the sixteenth century. Many of them were ordained bishops in the early years of the twentieth century. The only Church they knew was that heavily influenced by the Council of Trent and the Pian papacies.
They determined that the Church needed to undergo a profound renewal in spirit, structure and governance and they knew they had the authority to do this. That included giving priority to the introduction of the vernacular Mass which had been openly and frankly discussed at Trent.
And now for the last section:
4. A. you have not justified your assertion that Haas' lyrics are not congruent with the Church's teachings
Let us begin by having you defend the one I cited: "Ministry is not about whether one believes in God." If you think that belief in God is not ABSOLUTELY essential to Catholic ministry, I would very much like to hear your defense of that. Because on its face, I cannot find any way to defend that statement.
S. You have asserted that Haas’ lyrics are not congruent with Catholic teaching. I responded by insisting that the onus of proof is on you. You have avoided providing further argument just a reiteration of the original assertions. By the way, it’s not my duty to defend Haas but I will say that I believe what he is saying in his Creed list is reasonable and sound theologically. Read him again and you will see that he is pointing out that there is a huge difference between affirming Creedal statements of core beliefs and actually putting those beliefs into practice through disciple ship of Jesus Christ. Anyone can rattle of statements of a belief system but not everyone actually commits themselves to putting them into practice. When Jesus called Peter, Andrew, James and John, he did not tell them to learn the Catechism first but to follow him ‘immediately.’ I think Haas is getting as something like that.
A. 5. Lastly, to repeat my point above: Why are we not chanting the propers in every Mass?
S. I can only answer for myself, Athelstane. I appreciate chant on limited occasions but I don’t believe it is necessary for me to pray twice by singing Chant. Take a look at what people have been chatting about Monsignor Pope’s recent observations in various conservative blogs on the apparent stasis, even decline of the TLM. You personally had some sober thoughts about this on Fr Blake’s blog just recently I have noticed.
For forty years people on the conservative end of the Catholic spectrum were proclaiming that the ‘biological solution’ was taking care of the modernists. I may be wrong but it seems to me that the ‘modernists’ are not on the verge of extinction but the Trads and conservatives are.
I hope these responses have made my positions clearer to you. Thanks again.
The thoughts, will and intentions of the Fathers of Vatican II are known by what they did with the Council documents after 1965. They wrote them, they knew the thought and mind behind them and they acted on them.
Six Popes since have affirmed and upheld the Second Vatican Council. That, among other things, is your problem, not me.
I am sure you, Sean, have been a problem to everyone who has ever had the misfortune of dealing with a pompous moron like you. You are a problem to the human race. Archimago
If that's so, why isn't Latin instruction the norm in seminaries rather than the exception, and where's the Gregorian Chant?
Tancred, the Bishops, the clergy, the seminary authorities largely ignored Veterum Sapientiae because vernacular languages were introduced in both the Liturgy and seminary education. Before the Council, everything was in Latin. It was mostly used as the language of the Seminary class room but that was disappearing by the time the Council was underway.
Gregorian Chant goes natively with the Latin form of the Roman Rite. The Mass of 1570 is celebrated on a miniscule scale throughout the entire Church and Gregorian Chant is has been a casualty.
Conservatives might charge the 'modernists' with cherry picking the teachings they prefer. If one wants to engage in that kind of polemic, then the same charge of relativism can legitimately levelled at people like some conservatives who effectively reject Gaudium et Spes, sections of Lumnen Gentium, Nostra Aetate, the Declaration on Religious Liberty and the parts of Sacrosanctum Concilium dealing with the vernacular and the authority of local bishops in many areas of liturgical autonomy.
If you or the heretical, variously Gnostic and Arian Bishops in the Church can't abide by the words of the Council, you can scarcely fault traditionalists for ignoring it.
I am not at all clear about what you are saying, Tancred.
Who are the 'heretical, variously Gnostic and Arian Bishops in the Church?'..... Can you name a few and substantiate the allegations that they are Gnostics or Arians?
Fr Hunwicke, I applaud your support for free, candid debate on matters of some gravitas. Bravo, cheers.
The thoughts, will and intentions of the Fathers of Vatican II are known by what they did with the Council documents after 1965.
Yes, but a lot of them did it under obedience. "The Pope wants this." So they did it, even if some had misgivings.
Growing ultramontanism had exacted an unexpected price. No one ever expected a liberal to be elected as pope.
That, Athelstane, remains an assertion, a comfortable, unsubstantiated assertion.
Again, the onus is on you to back your claims with evidence. I suspect you will not because you cannot.
By the way, I don't think it was a surprise that a 'liberal was elected Pope.' If it's Bergoglio you are talking about, he was nearly elected back in 2005. At the General Congregations before the last Conclave, Cardinals like Pell and others made it quite clear that the Church needed to move on from the forty years of stagnation of the JPII-Benedict years during which the Catholic participation rate in Western countries declined by around 40%. People voted with their feet.
I also requested you to name exactly what Fathers of the Church and on what theological matters should provide guidance.
I await your ever courteous response.
Most of the Austrian Bishop's Conference, for example promotes aberrosexualism, and conveniently enough, runs a tidy porno business through Weltbild.
If you want American exemplars, just look at what Chicago got....
@athelstane, most of them did it out of acquiescence, since many of them were told that the questionable aspects of Vatican II were merely pastoral in nature.
Of course, Peritus Monsignor Bandas was inconsolable after the Council, for he foresaw clearly what would sweep over the Church in the next fifty years.
Even Wiltgen was more honest about the conniving of Suennens and his crew at the Council.
Most of the Austrian Bishop's Conference, for example promotes aberrosexualism,
That's a generalised assertion devoid of specifics. Who exactly are these bishops and what is your evidence for them promoting 'aberosexualism?'
and conveniently enough, runs a tidy porno business through Weltbild.
Where is your evidence for this?
If you want American exemplars, just look at what Chicago got....
What are you talking about? A string of ....s prove nothing.
Schönborn routinely promotes buggery (see Blasphemous Art Exhibit at Vienna Dom Bookstore), whether he praises Conchita Würst, overrules a pastor who overrules his parish in electing a cohabiting sodomite to the parish council president, told " Corriere della Sera" that he thinks sodomites' relationships should be praised. Where have you been?
The German and Austrian Bishops have been selling pornography through Weltbild for years. It's hardly a secret.
Do I have to provide further evidence for Cupich's issues as well?
Delete
All of this is assertion and your interpretation of what you see and hear. You have not proved that Schoenborn 'approves' of buggery at all. You seem to be equating his pastoral response to an morally ambiguous situation with approval of an objectively sinful situation.
And yes, the onus of proof is on you re your allegations about Chicago and ++ Cupich?
Both the CDF and the civil legal systems in democratic societies require due process. Do you consider yourself exempted from the obligations of divine and natural justice?
They're actual facts. The Hrdlicka exhibit was widely discussed even in the English language media, and you can check for yourself if you're really that interested about what was actually said, but the Porno Kardinal's sympathy for sodomy is well documented here on this website, the German and Italian media.
None of this would get to pre-trial in any decent judicial system.
You have not demonstrated that Cardinal Schoenborn personally supports homosexual behaviour or any other form of immorality.
You give your prejudice away Tancred by applying negative subjective epithets like 'Porno Kardinal.'
Throwing rocks does not clinch a weak argument. .
People have been convicted for less.
And I put the question to you again. Why are + Schönborn's interpretations of Vatican II in his obvious endorsements of sodomy and his praise for people in sinful relationships, more valid than Bishop Fellay's?
FR. Hunwicke? Regardless of who this is, Sean/Gaybrielle/Clark, has sunk to profanity, trolling some of the well-intentioned members of the forum and proving to be persistently incorrigible. Some people aren't worth my time, but I certainly appreciate YOUR time and agree wholeheartedly with your comments.
Cardinal Kasper's seething contempt for B16 was palpable, as was that of other Cardinals and Archbishops of the Modernist school of Bologna, including Mahony, who goes into a long overdue retirement in about three weeks.
You're captain of the loaded question, for that is what this is, so why not provide the reader with your pre-packaged answer? As for Fellay, I know nothing of his views on sodomy and how do they relate to this 'conversation?'
BTW, does your Duchy or Principate operate according to the Napoleonic code of Justice? It's relevant to your claims about both Schoenborn and Cupich among others.
Why is your interpretation of V2 more valid than that of a traditionalist?
Does your gay bar have a special mug for Cupich?
The Gay Porn Kardinal (see Alfred Hrdlika) installed a public sinner, an unrepentant sodomite, to the parish counsel president's position and held a controversially fawning meeting with the new president with positive accolades from the media.
http://www.eponymousflower.blogspot.de/2012/05/viennese-gomorrah-diocese-out-of.html?m=1
Once again, Tancred, rock throwing doesn't clinch a debate nor does self-referential bits from this blog provide clear evidence that Cardinal Schoeborn personally endorses sodomy. So far you have been running around in the circles of your own assertions.
You need to sort out your propaganda from objective reality.
I think you should also be very, very ashamed of yourself for hurling the 'gay' barb at me who is most definitely not one.
I understand, you and people of your ideological hobby society get to define what Vatican II means, and it's permissible for you to hurl insults, and quite nasty and spiteful ones by the way, but when someone else does it, that's suddenly not ok.
Hrdlika, an unrepentant aberrosexual Communist, was laid to rest in the consecrated (?) ground of the cathedral cemetery by the effeminate, chronically liturgy abusing cathedral pastor, Toni Faber to the local Communist Party's band playing the International as his bloated, diseased corpse was lowered into hallowed Austrian soil.
As I explained to the courteous Athelstane, the 2800 bishops of Vatican II defined and interpreted that the intention of the Council was and put it into action.
As for nasty, hurtful insults, check the historical record of this blog and take a look at the treatment you and your disciples have dished out to those who would dare check and challenge the stream of vitriol, hatred and contempt for Pope Francis, Vatican II, the Novus Ordo, the official teaching of Pope Francis and the outcomes of the past two synods.
Not very edifying at all, Tancred.
This is your last chance. If Vatican II was put into action, where is the Gregorian Chant, normative Latin instruction in the seminaries, where is Latin in the liturgy as it specifically sought?
You're not courteous, so why do you who are so rude and vicious expect people to be courteous to you?
Pope Francis has plenty of contempt for faithful Catholics as his record shows.
Indeed, where is the Catholic Faith as it was handed down, always and everywhere believed? It's as hard to find as a Latin Mass, I reckon.
You clearly don't have it.
As I mentioned a number of times to the courteous and polite Athelstane, the bishops who knew that the documents of Vatican II represented deals and compromises between different groups, simply went away from the Council in 1965 and disregarded the Latin Mass, Latin in seminaries and consciously opted for the vernacular and new structures of Church governance. They were the Council Fathers, they knew they had the authority of interpret, teach and implement the Council's will and intention.
They cherry picked what their people wanted and what was an appropriate expression of the Tradition in modern forms. The Catholic Faith is not a piece of granite. It is the belief of flesh and blood human beings who grow and incarnate its core in new forms all the time.
Read Newman on the Development of Doctrine.
The Church will never return to what it was in the pre-Vatican II era. You need, I suggest, to get used to it. Unfortunately the schismatic Lefebvre and his modern disciples did not and do not to this day. They will die outside the One True Church.
So being a Council Father gives them the mandate to ignore the Council.
Thanks.
No, to interpret the Council because they were the Council, knew its mind. When it came to pastoral applications they did what they gave themselves permission to do just as St Charles Borromeo did post Trent in Milan along with the other bishops in their dioceses. Ecumenical councils are not snap frozen in time. Borromeo taught that Councils live because their bishops and people live and so Council teachings develop.
Vere, ululat canis ad lunam.
What a pity, "Ben," that the little Latin you learned in seminary---when you were in the process of apostatizing from the True Faith---is now left for invective, the usual recourse of those cowards who have no argument. The only mad dogs howling at the moon these days are your certifiably insane pope and the jackals like you who are thirsting after the destruction of Catholicism. Archimago
Yes, they interpreted according to a tradition of novelty, which dis-included things the Council explicitly stated [Latin education, Latin Liturgy, Gregorian Chant, Catholic Faith] and included things which were nowhere to be found [Liturgical Abuses, Heterodoxy, Feminism, etc...]. Such magical thinking is a hallmark of the Baloney School.
That's fine, I'll just delete all of Sean/Gaybriel/Carl/Ben posts from now on.
When it came to pastoral applications they did what they gave themselves permission to do just as St Charles Borromeo did post Trent in Milan along with the other bishops in their dioceses.
But what provisions of Trent did Borromeo ignore or openly flout in his administration of the Archdiocese of Milan?
Hello Sean,
That, Athelstane, remains an assertion, a comfortable, unsubstantiated assertion.
Again, the onus is on you to back your claims with evidence. I suspect you will not because you cannot.
It's substantiated because it's a refrain that was repeated by a number of prelates in the years after the Council.
I'm in a hurry here so I'll make do with one prominent such substantiation: See Louis Bouyer's Memoires. Bouyer recounts that numerous items were pushed through through the Concilium because it was relayed to them that "the Pope wants it." (To take two examples: the dismantling of the liturgy for the dead and in purging the “imprecatory” verses from the psalms in the Divine Office.) That Paul VI might not have actually *wanted* every such item is really beside the point; the authority of the pope was seen as sufficient to carry the day. It's a view of papal authority that would have been unthinkable in an earlier age.
Some prelates were, by the 60's, already liberals. But many others were simply operating in an ultramontanist mode. This was the peril of the mindset that emerged from Vatican I; but few ever imagined that a liberal could be elected as Pope, as I said. Once one did (Montini), he could use this mindset to dismantle a great deal (and erect new things), relying on the obedience of the clergy, no matter how many misgivings many might have.
By the way, I don't think it was a surprise that a 'liberal was elected Pope.' If it's Bergoglio you are talking about, he was nearly elected back in 2005.
Actually, it was Paul VI/Montini whom I had in mind. And I think it's a fair characterization to say that all of the postconciliar popes have been liberals as the term would have been conventionally defined in the Church before the Council - albeit in varying degrees.
We have only sketchy unofficial accounts of the 2005 conclave, so there's some conjecture by all of us here. But from what I have seen, Bergoglio never had a real shot at election, never breaking 40 votes. That said, I think it's fair to say that Bergoglio represents a substantial slice of the episcopate today in his theological outlook and instincts, if not his temperament or specific politics (which in his case is eclectically Peronista). In many precincts of the Church, he's very arguably more representative than Ratzinger ever was.
I also requested you to name exactly what Fathers of the Church and on what theological matters should provide guidance.
I await your ever courteous response.
I'm content to defer to St. Vincent of Lerins' Rule on on this - ubique, semper, ab omnibus, rather than relying on one specific Father - in short, the sense of a relative consensus of antiquity.
Hello Sean,
I'm afraid keeping up with this (rapidly broadening) discussion is moving beyond my time constraints. I'm going to have cherry pick a couple items for the time being.
1. I remain mystified as to why you can't see that David Haas's "Creed" is not profoundly problematic - unless you're even more radical in your theology than I credited. Haas insists in his VERY FIRST proposition that belief in God is not necessary for ministry. "Ministry is not about whether one believes in God." In fact, it's the most important prerequisite for it! If you do not believe in God, why are you bothering with ministry at all? It violates the very first proposition of the Apostle's Creed (Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem, Creatorem caeli et terrae) and likewise the Nicene Creed. Haas's understanding seems wholly materialist, for ex: "Ministry is not about providing answers — it’s about provoking more and more fresh questions." Haas fails to understand that ministry is about the salvation of souls (See Lumen Gentium 9 on this) - it's not a speculative theology symposium!
I don't know what else to say, usefully, on this subject. Almost every proposition of Haas's Creed is likewise problematic on its very face.
[to be continued in second post]
To Sean (Part 2)
2. Take a look at what people have been chatting about Monsignor Pope’s recent observations in various conservative blogs on the apparent stasis, even decline of the TLM. You personally had some sober thoughts about this on Fr Blake’s blog just recently I have noticed. For forty years people on the conservative end of the Catholic spectrum were proclaiming that the ‘biological solution’ was taking care of the modernists. I may be wrong but it seems to me that the ‘modernists’ are not on the verge of extinction but the Trads and conservatives are.
I remain wary of expressions like "biological solutions," because we're all subject to them in the end. What's more worrying to note, however, is that, to the extent that demography is making an impact on the Church, especially in America and Western Europe, it's beginning to deprive us not only of Baby Boomer and Silent Generation clergy, but also Baby Boomer and Silent Generation. I look around the pews at diocesan parishes in my region (I live in the Washington/Baltimore area), and I see mostly grey (or no!) hair, and very few young people. There are exceptions, of course, but they're generally just that - exceptions. There are not that many Gen X or Millennials coming up behind them. Clergy I talk to feel that a massive wave of parish closings and consolidations unlike anything seen before is liiming very soon.
As far as traditionalists are concerned, no one does statistic analysis on this. That said: I might point you to a recent essay I helped write (in response to the Msgr Pope essay) as part of Juventutem DC: "Evangelizing the Reluctant Pearl Merchant," OnePeterFive, Jan. 14, 2016. Allow me to quote myself: "In 1988, Pope St. John Paul II renewed the indult for the traditional Mass when there were only six such Masses (known) in the US. When Pope Benedict XVI issued Summorum Pontificum in July 2007, the number had grown to over 200. Today, according to the Coalition Ecclesia Dei, there are now 476 publicly scheduled regular EF Mass locations in the US." indeed, over 92% of U.S. dioceses now have a weekly TLM. That doesn't sound like extinction to me. Similarly: "Also, we cannot overlook the emergence of canonical communities, taking the form of oratories, personal parishes, personal quasi-parishes, or priories, exclusively (or nearly so) devoted to the Extraordinary Form since the invitation of the FSSP to its first apostolate in Dallas in 1991 – now numbering over 50 in the US." One sees a similar record of growth of the TLM in England, France, Germany and Poland (which now has over 200 regular TLMs, almost all erected in the last five years!). The overall numbers might remain modest relative to the whole of the Church, but clearly, it's growing, not shrinking - which is not something that can be said for diocesan Church in most parts of the West, or Latin America.
Msgr. Pope is a fine priest who has been celebrating the TLM, even back when it was virtually unheard of to do so. The warning note he sounded was a note of frustration, I think, based narrowly on the struggles of his longstanding monthly Sunday evening Solemn High TLM. But it's worth noting that when he began offering this Mass, there were only two TLMs in the entire DC area, counting both the Archdiocese of Washington and the Diocese of Arlington. But today, there are 5 public regular TLM's offering in Washington, and 16(!) in Arlington, and a dozens of Solemn High TLM's per year now. This, we think, has made his offering (which is not weekly and not at an ideal time) less of a special event than it once was - though we appreciate very much his continuing to offer it.
Typo correction in my first post: The sentence should read: "What's more worrying to note, however, is that, to the extent that demography is making an impact on the Church, especially in America and Western Europe, it's beginning to deprive us not only of Baby Boomer and Silent Generation clergy, but also Baby Boomer and Silent Generation laity.
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