THE PRESENT LEGAL STATUS OF THE TRADITIONAL LATIN MASS by Fr. Paul Leonard, B.Ph., S.T.B., M.Div. TRADITIO Traditional Roman Catholic Internet Site E-mail List: traditio@traditio.com, Web Page: http://www.traditio.com Copyright 1994-97 PL. Reproduction prohibited without authorization. [The author of this article proposes to demonstrate that the traditional Latin Mass remains to this day the official liturgy of the Roman Church. It is also demonstrated that the institution of the new rite was illegal and contrary to Catholic dogmatic teaching and the Second Vatican Council.] On July 11, 1988, Pope John Paul, speaking of those Catholics who feel attached to the traditional Latin Mass stated in his Motu Proprio: "...I wish to manifest my will to facilitate their ecclesial communion by means of the necessary measures to GUARANTEE RESPECT FOR THEIR RIGHTFUL ASPIRATIONS. In this matter I ask for the support of the bishops and of all those engaged in the pastoral ministry of the Church." In this statement, the Holy Father has made it clear that Catholics do indeed have a right to their traditional rite of Mass, and he makes it equally clear that the bishops and pastors must respect this right. Cardinal Silvio Oddi further clarified the matter when he stated: "It needs to be said that the Mass of St. Pius V has in fact never been officially abrogated. Paul VI's motu proprio instituting the new mass contained no form of words explicitly forbidding the Tridentine rite."1 Bishop Forester, quoted by Fr. Brian Houghton, also explained the matter when he wrote : "The New Ordo ...is merely a licit exception, a derogation, to the previous laws which are still in force."2 What this means is that THE TRIDENTINE MASS REMAINS TO THIS DAY THE OFFICIAL LITURGY OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. Legally the traditional rite remains in force as it was mandated by Pope St. Pius V, while the Novus Ordo is merely an exception to the rule. Nevertheless, a great number of bishops and other ecclesiastics who occupy positions of authority have attempted to unlawfully suppress the traditional Roman Rite of Mass. The intolerance and injustice which a large segment of the hierarchy has demonstrated towards the rightful aspirations of traditionally minded Catholics has prompted Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, to call for "an examination of conscience,": "We should allow ourselves to ask fundamental questions, about the defects in the pastoral life of the Church...", Cardinal Ratzinger said.3 Certainly there may be many who will ask: "What about Vatican II? Didn't the Council decree that there should be a new rite of Mass?" The answer to this question is a very emphatic NO. The Second Vatican Council decreed that the liturgy of the Roman Rite be revised. It did not decree a radical reform or an entirely new rite. The Liturgy Constitution, SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, reads: The rite of the Mass is to be revised in such a way that the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts, as well as the connection between them, may be more clearly manifested, and that devout and active participation by the faithful may be more easily achieved. For this purpose the rites are to be simplified, due care being taken to preserve their substance; elements which, with the passage of time, came to be duplicated, or were added with but little advantage, are now to be discarded; other elements which have suffered injury through accidents of history are now to be restored according to the pristine norm of the holy Fathers, to the extent that they may seem useful or necessary. 4 There are some key passages in this text, and elsewhere in this conciliar document that must be examined in order to determine if the creation of a New Order of Mass and the suppression of the traditional rite corresponds to the express wishes of the Second Vatican Council, or if it is rather a rejection of both that Council and the perpetual teaching and tradition of the Church: 1) The rite of the Mass is to be revised... The revision of the ancient Roman Rite is prescribed, there is no mention of a liturgical reform that will sweep away the old rite and replace it with a new one. 2) ...the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts...more clearly manifested... The sacred mystery of the altar must be manifested more clearly, it must not be obscured in ambiguities. 3) ...restored according to the pristine norm of the holy Fathers. Restoration means that the ancient structure and form are to be preserved, and not be replaced with novel inventions. In addition to these there are other passages of this document which express the mind of the Council in those matters concerning the revision of the liturgy: Finally, in faithful obedience to tradition, the sacred Council declares that Holy Mother Church holds all lawfully recognized rites to be of equal right and dignity; that she wishes to preserve them in the future and to foster them in every way. The Council also desires that, where necessary, the rites be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition, and that they be given new vigor to meet the present-day circumstances and needs. 5 -------- In order that sound tradition be retained...there must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them, and care must be taken that any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing. 6 -------- In this restoration both text and rites should be ordered so as to express more clearly the holy things they signify. 7 Here are the key passages: 1) ...in faithful obedience to tradition... 2) ...all lawfully recognized rites...to preserve them in the future and to foster them in every way... 3) ...the rites be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition... 4) ...In order that sound tradition be retained...there must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them... 5) ...any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing... 6) ...In this restoration both text and rites should be ordered so as to express more clearly the holy things they signify. It is absolutely clear according to the text of SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, that the traditional rite of Mass of the Roman Church is to be preserved and restored, and it must clearly express the dogmatic truths that it had previously expressed. The Council very clearly did not call for the institution of an entirely new rite of Mass, but, not unlike the Council of Trent , it intended to revise and preserve the ancient Roman Rite. In 1570 Pope St. Pius V revised and codified the Roman Rite of the Mass in the bull QUO PRIMUM. It is important to bear in mind that Pope St. Pius V did not institute the Tridentine Mass, but he merely restored and codified the immemorial Roman Rite of the Mass. The Council of Trent had no intention to institute a new liturgy. "The Council of Trent (1545-1563)," Davies observes, "did indeed appoint a commission to examine the Roman Missal, and to revise and restore it 'according to the custom and rite of the Holy Fathers.' The new Missal was eventually promulgated by Pope St. Pius V in 1570 with the Bull QUO PRIMUM." In the Bull QUO PRIMUM, Pius V did not institute a new rite of the Mass. Davies demonstrates this by citing eminent authorities: ...Father David Knowles, who was Britain's most distinguished Catholic scholar until his death in 1974, pointed out" that: The Missal of 1570 was indeed the result of instructions given at Trent, but it was, in fact, as regards the Ordinary, Canon, Proper of the time and much else a replica of the Roman Missal of 1474, which in its turn repeated in all essentials the practice of the Roman Church of the epoch of Innocent III, which itself derived from the Usage of Gregory the Great and his successors in the seventh century.In short, the Missal of 1570 was, in all essentials, the usage of the mainstream of medieval European liturgy which included England and all its rites.8 Although the rite continued to develop after the time of St. Gregory, Father Fortescue explains that: All later modifications were fitted into the old arrangement, and the most important parts were not touched. From, roughly, the time of St. Gregory we have the text of the Mass, in order and arrangement, as a sacred tradition that no one has ventured to touch except in unimportant details.9 Fortescue continues: So our Mass goes back without essential change, to the age when it first developed out of the oldest liturgy of all. It is still redolent of that liturgy, of the days when Caesar ruled the world ...The final result of our enquiry is that, in spite of unresolved problems, in spite of later changes, there is not in Christendom another rite so venerable as ours. 10 Father Louis Bouyer: The Roman Canon, as it is today, [written before Vatican II] goes back to Gregory the Great. There is not, in the East or in the West, a Eucharistic Prayer remaining in use to this day, that can boast of such antiquity. In the eyes not only of the Orthodox, but of Anglicans and even those Protestants who have still to some extent, a feeling for tradition. To jettison it would be a rejection of any claim on the part of the Roman Church to represent the true Catholic Church." Similarly, Kevin Starr in the SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER (15 April 1978) explains: It took the Latin Church 500 years to evolve a worship service equal to this awesome compelling leap to the Godhead through the Risen Eucharistic Christ. For a Thousand years Catholics prayed this way at Mass. In the 16th century Council of Trent, this 1000 year old Mass was standardized, codified, made the norm of the universal Church. Another 400 years went by - 400 years of dignified compelling worship... In his recent work, THE ETERNAL SACRIFICE, Davies makes the important observation that: At no time in the history of the Roman Rite was there ever any question of a pope setting up a commission to compose new prayers and ceremonies. The ceremonies evolved almost imperceptibly, and in every case, codification, that is the incorporation of these prayers into the liturgical books, followed upon their development...particular prayers and ceremonies were found in the Missal because they were being used in the Mass, and not vice versa. Professor Owen Chadwick, one of Britain's greatest historians, remarks: "Liturgies are not made, they grow in the devotion of the centuries." 11 Precisely what St. Pius V did to the ancient Mass rite of the Roman Church is succinctly summed up by Davies: The Bull QUO PRIMUM of St. Pius V: 1) does not promulgate a new rite but consolidates and codifies the immemorial Roman Rite; 2) It extends its use throughout the Latin Church, except, 3) for rites having a continuous usage of over two hundred years; 4) and grants an indult to all priests to freely and lawfully use this Missal in perpetuity; 5) The Bull specifies minutely the persons, times and the places to which its provisions apply; 6) The obligation is confirmed by express sanctions. Since that time, no Pope has ever himself formally decreed the abrogation or obrogation of QUO PRIMUM, and certainly no Pope has ever presumed to abolish the traditional Roman Rite of the Mass. From this it should already be clear that any priest of the Roman Rite is entitled to celebrate the traditional Mass anywhere, at any time, in accordance with liturgical laws...(and) the laity are just as much entitled to assist at the traditional Mass as priests of the Roman Rite are to celebrate it. The traditional Roman Rite of Mass is the universal and perpetual custom of the Church, rooted in Apostolic Tradition. It cannot ever be lawfully suppressed. The proposition that the established customary ceremonies and rites of the Roman Church can be suppressed and replaced by the innovations and inventions of bureaucrats is contrary to the doctrine of the Faith. The Roman Rite, as we have seen, is the most ancient rite of Mass; and, as Jungmann points out, it grew out of the apostolic traditions. Concerning the Canon of that rite, the Council of Trent declared, " it is made up from the words of Our Lord from apostolic traditions, and from devout instructions of the holy pontiffs." 12 Very clearly, the ancient Roman Rite of the Mass is not something that a Pope instituted or decreed into existence. It is the sacred patrimony of the Roman Church, and it cannot be lawfully suppressed. St. Peter Canisius, Doctor of the Church, wrote in his Summa Doctrinae Christianae: "It behooves us unanimously and inviolably to observe the ecclesiastical traditions, whether codified or simply retained by the customary practice of the Church." We see the same teaching set forth by St. Peter Damien, also a Doctor of the Church: "It is unlawful to alter the established customs of the Church...Remove not the ancient landmarks which thy fathers have set." This doctrine is the infallible teaching of the Catholic Church, and therefore it must be believed with divine and Catholic Faith, since it is set forth is the Profession of Faith of Pius IV: I most steadfastly admit and embrace Apostolic and Ecclesiastical Traditions and all other observances and institutions of the said Church...I also receive and admit the received and approved ceremonies of the Catholic Church used in the solemn administration of the sacraments. 13 When Pope Paul VI approved the Missal for the New Rite of Mass, he did not abolish the Traditional Rite. Pope Paul's Apostolic Constitution Missale Romanum is a very curious document. Being an Apostolic Constitution, one would expect it to solemnly decree legislation for the purpose of regulating the discipline of the universal Church. However, Missale Romanum does nothing of that nature.14 It does not establish any norms for the use of the new Missal in the churches of the Latin Rite. In Missale Romanum, Pope Paul VI did nothing but approve the text of the new Missal. In doing so he also decreed the addition of three new Eucharistic Prayers into the Missal and establish the formulae of consecration to be published in the new Missal. Hence, when Pope Paul VI declared: "We wish that these our decrees and prescriptions may be firm and effective now and in the future, notwithstanding, to the extent necessary, the apostolic constitutions and ordinances issues by our Predecessors, and other prescriptions, even those deserving particular mention and derogation", he made no ruling over the discipline that governs the worship of the Church. Nothing at all is prescribed concerning where when, and by whom this new liturgical book must, or even may be used. The use of the new Missal is simply not mandated. It is nowhere mandated that this Missal is henceforth to be used in the Churches of the Latin Rite by the clergy of that rite. The only thing that Missale Romanum mandates is the inclusion of prayers and formulae into the book! It derogates the laws that had previously proscribed the publication of any new missal, but it does not derogate the previous legislation which forbids the use of any new missal. Bishop Forester, in Fr. Brian Houghton's book, MITRE AND CROOK observes: This has been the most puzzling history of all. May I remind you, Fathers, that we already have two documents of the highest conceivable authority: the Bull QUO PRIMUM and the Constitution SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, which are, moreover, in line with each other. What happens next? On April 3rd, 1969, a Papal Constitution entitled Missale Romanum was promulgated purporting to be the law governing the New Order of Mass, as yet unpublished. In this original version it is not a law at all but an explanatory introduction to a permission. Even the word 'Constitutio' is nowhere to be found in the text, merely in the title: 1) There is no abrogation of previous legislation and no clause ordering the use of the new rite. 2) There is no sentence to show that it is obligatory, let alone exclusive. 3) There is no dating clause to show when it should come into effect. This of course did not prevent the powers that be from saying that it was a binding law. to do so they had recourse to a mistranslation. What is so curious is that the mistranslation was common to all languages. I have read it myself in English, French and Italian I am told that it is the same in German and Spanish. How can this possibly come about? How can all these expert translators make the identical mistranslation? Your guess is as good as mine. Here is the sentence, the fourth before the end of the original version, the fifth in the Acta: Ad extremum, ex iis quae hactenus de novo Missale Romano exposuimus quiddam nunc cogere et efficere placet... I have underlined the mistranslated words. "Cogere et efficere" is a well known Ciceronian phrase to be found in most dictionaries. Even if the translators could not be bothered to look it up, it is perfectly clear that "quiddam cogere" breaks down into "agere quiddam con" = to work something together, which is in the context "to sum up." Equally, "quiddam efficere" breaks down into "facere quiddam ex" = to make something out, which is in the context "to draw a conclusion." And what did all the translators make of it? "In conclusion, We now wish to give the force of law to all We have declared..."; and in French, "Pour terminer, Nous voulons donner force de loi a tout ce que Nous avons expose..."; and in Italian etc. It is strange, my dear Fathers, but such is the truth: "to sum up and draw a conclusion" becomes "to give the force of law." And what did I do about it? Absolutely nothing for the simple reason that I did not bother to read the Latin until two or three years later. Do not judge me too severely. Have you read it? But that is not the end. Worse is to come. The Acta for June, 1969, were published as usual about two months later. When it appeared, a brand new clause had been inserted into the original document as the penultimate paragraph. It reads: Quae Constitutione hac Nostra praescripsimus vigere incipient a XXX proximi mensis Novembris hoc anno, id est a Dominica I Adventus. That is, "What we have ordered by this Our constitution will begin to take effect as from November of this year (1969), that is the first Sunday of Advent." You will notice: 1) that for the first and only time the word "Constitutio" appears in the text. 2) For the first time, too, a word signifying "to order" is introduced - "praescripsimus." 3) For the first time a date is given on which the order is to become effective. This is a permission turned into a law. Actually, there are a couple of snags even about this insertion. The word "praescripsimus" = We have ordered - is not the proper term in Latin, but I shall not bother you with refinements. More important, it is in the wrong tense. Up to this point the legislator has prescribed nothing at all. It is precisely in this clause that he claims to do so. The verb, therefore should be in the present tense: "praescribimus" = "what We are ordering by this our Constitution": not in the past perfect, "what we have prescribed." The only explanation I can think of for this howler is recognition by its author that he is tampering with a pre-existing text. Moreover, the logical conclusion from the use of the wrong tense can scarcely be what its author intended: since nothing was prescribed, nothing is prescribed; and the legislator, to boot, is still prescribing nothing. What a mess! I wonder how long a civil government would last which thus tampered with its own laws? There is a last remark I wish to make about this strange document. It winds up with the usual clause de style: "We wish , moreover, that these decisions and ordinances of ours should be stable and effective now and in the future, notwithstanding - in so far as may be necessary - Constitutions and apostolic regulations published by Our predecessors and all other ordinances, even those requiring special mention and derogation." At long last - indeed it is the last word - there is a "technical" term in the constitution, so we know exactly where we stand: "derogation". The New Ordo is therefore only a permission after all. It is merely a licit exception, a derogation, to the previous laws which are still in force. They have not been abrogated...It is nonsense to claim that the bull Quo Primum has been abrogated. After the publication of Missale Romanum there appeared other documents emanating from the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship, all of which seem to implicitly assume as their point of departure the legally unfounded notion that the New Missal has replaced the Missal promulgated by Pope St. Pius V. Ordo Missae specifies the rubrics for the new rite. Ordo Lectionum Missae presents the new Lectionary for the new rite. There is an Instruction on October 20 1969. None of these documents bears the signature of the Pope. They are curial documents. All of the curial legislation that would attempt to nullify QUO PRIMUM is deficient, because no office, congregation, or commission can validly overrule the solemn decrees of a Supreme Pontiff. Only the Pope possesses the plenitude of power which the Lord conferred upon Peter and his successors when He said: "I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in Heaven."15 While it is true that the Pope's subordinates exercise papal authority when it is delegated to them, that delegated authority only exist within defined limits. Only the Pope can exercise the full plenitude of power of the keys, because Christ conferred that singular prerogative upon his vicar alone. The Pope, therefore, cannot validly confer that upon anyone, and hence, it is impossible for the officials of the Roman Curia to exercise the supreme power of the keys to loose what a previous pope has solemnly declared to be binding in perpetuity. This is a power that Christ singularly bestowed upon the Roman Pontiff, and therefore cannot be validly delegated to a subordinate. This is precisely the juridical deficiency of the above mentioned post conciliar curial documents, since there is absolutely nothing of a legal nature in the Conciliar decrees which presumes or intends to abrogate QUO PRIMUM or to abolish the traditional Roman Rite. After the publication of Missale Romanum, someone in the Vatican noticed that Pope Paul's promulgation was only an approval for the text of the new book, and therefore someone decided that the Missal for the New Mass needed to be promulgated in such a manner that would authorize the use of the new Missal. This is precisely what the bureaucrats did when on March 26, 1970, the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship, by order of Paul VI "promulgated" the new Missal. It acknowledges the fact that Missale Romanum approved texts for the Missal (approbatis textibus ad Missale Romanum pertinentibus per Constitutionem Apostolicam Missale Romanum). The document allows the immediate use of the Latin edition as soon as it is published and concedes to the bishops' conferences the authority to establish when the vernacular editions may be used. This decree in no way attempted to abrogate the old rite, nor did it mandate the use of the new rite, but it merely permitted the use of the new Missal. 16 Similarly the Sacred Congregation's Instruction of Sept. 5, 1970 does not presume to impose any obligation that would require the use of the New Rite of Mass. It contains no nonobstat, and when asked, Paul VI did not refer to this document as imposing any obligation to use the New Missal. Just what was the origin of the alleged obligation to use the new Missal? Michael Davies explains that "...Pope Paul VI himself stated in his Consistory Allocution of 24 May 1976 that 'the adoption of the (new) Ordo Missae is certainly not left up the free choice of priests or faithful.' This indicates that he himself believed the New Mass to be mandatory - but, astonishingly, as his authority for this opinion, he cited the 1971 Instruction and not his own Apostolic Constitution." That document was in fact, not even an Instruction but merely a Notification. It is impossible for a mere notification made by a Roman Congregation to overrule the solemn decree of a Supreme Pontiff, and it is absolutely incredible that a Pope could believe that curial bureaucrats can establish the liturgical discipline of the Roman Church, and that they could do it by means of a mere notification! Unfortunately, that is what Pope Paul believed, but that was only his personal opinion which he never expressed in any formal and legally binding decree. Some have had recourse to the law governing immemorial customs in order to adhere to the traditional rite without being persecuted by various ecclesiastical authorities. The Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship, however, has demonstrated that it has no respect for Canon Law when the law interferes with their agenda. According to both the old and the new codes of Canon Law, an immemorial custom cannot be abrogated except by explicit mention in the new legislation, and no post conciliar legislation has ever presumed to abrogate the immemorial custom of the venerable Roman Rite. That unfortunately did not prevent the Sacred Congregation from issuing a ruling on 28 October 1974 which denied that the Tridentine Mass could be celebrated under "any pretext of custom, even immemorial custom." Unabashedly and in dictatorial strongman fashion, the bureaucrats of the Roman Curia seem to be saying: "To Hell with the Law, you must obey us even if we are outside the Law." Davies summed up well the legal quandary of the Curia when he wrote: The problem faced by the Vatican as a result of the widespread support for the Tridentine Mass was that it had condoned its almost universal suppression without giving formal and binding legal sanction to this suppression; and, furthermore, this illegal suppression has been given support in documents emanating from the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship. 17 All of the new legislation enacted by Paul VI only derogates the previous legislation which would have prohibited the new rite,18 but nowhere does any of Paul VI's legislation ever presume to abrogate, obrogate 19 or in any manner abolish the provisions of QUO PRIMUM which explicitly "give and grant in perpetuity that for the singing or reading of Mass in any Church whatsoever this Missal (the Tridentine Missal) may be followed absolutely, without any scruple of conscience, or fear of incurring any penalty, judgement or censure, and may be freely and lawfully used. Nor shall bishops, administrators, canons, chaplains and other secular priests, or religious of whatsoever order or by whatsoever title designated, be obliged to celebrate Mass otherwise than enjoined by us." Hence, any prelate, be he bishop or cardinal or whatever, who attempts to forbid the celebration of the Traditional Mass is entirely outside the law. In fact, if any ordinary presumes to forbid the traditional Latin Mass, he thereby refuses submission to formally enacted papal legislation which remains in force, and therefore that bishop falls into schism.20 The indult granted by Pope John Paul II in 1984 in no way abolishes the traditional Mass. First of all, the document does not mandate the use of the new Missal nor suppress the old rite. It is only a permission: The indult permits the use of the old Missal under certain circumstances, but there is no law that prohibits its use when those conditions are not present. It is very important to bear in mind that a priest is bound in conscience under pain of mortal sin to obey the solemn decrees whereby the Pope governs the liturgical discipline of the universal Church. Pope Paul VI only approved the text of the new Missal, and therefore, in accordance with Canon 18 of the new Code of Canon Law (Canon 19 in the old Code), the derogations mentioned in the nonobstat clause of Missale Romanum refer only to previous legislation that proscribed the publication of any new Missal, but it did not derogate or in any way nullify the solemnly decreed papal legislation that prohibits the use of a new rite of Mass. That legislation, which forbids the use of any new rite remains in force to this day. The traditional Roman Rite of Mass grew out of the worship of the entire Church, and was then legally codified after the development had already reached its term. The Tridentine Mass was truly and fully a profession of the faith of the Catholic Church. As Jungmann observes, "The entire teaching of the Church is contained in the liturgy".(Handing on the Faith) The New Mass, on the other hand, did not spring forth from the living worship of the Catholic Church, but was drawn up by a commission of bureaucrats. It is not an explicit profession of faith as was the old rite, but rather it clearly reflects the mind-set of that relatively small group of bureaucrats and experts. The New Mass has, as Davies points out, "in many points every possibility of satisfying the most modernistic of Protestants." This was also the opinion of Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci, who presented to Pope Paul VI the Critical Study on the New Order of Mass which states: "...the Novus Ordo Missae-- considering the new elements, susceptible of widely differing evaluations, which appear to be implied or taken for granted-- represents, as a whole and in detail, a striking departure from the Catholic theology of the Holy Mass as it was formulated in Session XXII of the Council of Trent..." The bureaucrats have mesmerized a considerable portion of the bishops, many of whom believe that the New Mass is the fruit of the liturgical reform decreed by the Council. We have seen, as Davies points out, "the Liturgy Constitution ordering that all rights shall be preserved and fostered...authorizing a revision of the Roman Rite (but)...the New Mass is not an act of obedience to a decision of Vatican II, it is a calculated rejection of the Liturgy Constitution of that Council." 21 SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM stated that "the liturgy is made up of unchangeable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change."22 The Council, however, did not make any declaration regarding what changes would be licit. Nevertheless, there is a body of Catholic teaching regarding what may lawfully be done to the liturgy which, unfortunately seems to have been largely forgotten by the vast majority of Catholics, laity and hierarchy alike. Changes in the liturgy, throughout the history of the Church, have been the result of a gradual development that took place during the course of the centuries. This is what Canon Smith explained in THE TEACHING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, where he says "...throughout the history of the development of the sacramental liturgy, the tendency has been towards growth- additions and accretions, the effort to obtain a fuller more perfect symbolism."23 "This", Davies points out, "was a key point in the Catholic Bishops' vindication of APOSTOLICAE CURAE": That in earlier times local Churches were permitted to add new prayers and ceremonies is acknowledged...But that they were also permitted to subtract prayers and ceremonies in previous use, and even to remodel the existing rites in a most drastic manner, is a proposition for which we know of no historical foundation, and which appears to us as absolutely incredible. 24 Pope Leo XIII explained in his Constitution Orientalium Dignitas, that the Church "allows and makes provision for some innovations in exterior forms, mostly when they are in conformity with the ancient past." So, Pope Leo explained, that some innovations can be made, but these are mostly changes that restore the rite. Pope Pius XI summed up well what has always been the mind of the Church down through the ages when he, in Divini Cultus stated: No wonder then, that the Roman Pontiffs have been so solicitous to safeguard and protect the liturgy. They have used the same care in making laws for the regulation of the liturgy, in preserving it from adulteration, as they have in giving accurate expression to the dogmas of the faith. It is not sufficient that a liturgy merely be free from any explicit error in order to be licit. The liturgy is not only an expression of worship, but it is also a profession of faith, and as such it must give clear expression to the doctrine of the faith. Pope Pius XII, in his Encyclical Mediator Dei (1947), declared: In the liturgy we make explicit profession of our Catholic faith;...the whole liturgy contains the Catholic faith, inasmuch as it is a public profession of the faith of the Church...This is the origin of the well known and time-honored principle: 'the norm of prayer establishes the norm of belief'. Pius XI also issued statements of a similar nature: "It (the Mass) is the most important organ of the Ordinary and Universal Magisterium of the Church"25 ; and in his Encyclical "Quas Primas" 1925, the same Pontiff explained that "people are instructed in the truths of the faith and brought to appreciate the inner joys of religion far more effectively by the ...celebration of our sacred mysteries than by any pronouncement, however weighty, made by the teaching of the Church." Three years later the same Pope elaborated this point more fully in the Apostolic Constitution Divini Cultus (1928): There exists, therefore, a close relationship between dogma and the sacred liturgy, as also between the Christian cult and the sanctification of the people. This is why Pope Celestine I thought that the rule of faith is expressed in the ancient liturgical formulations; he said that 'the norm of prayer establishes the norm of belief'. It may be objected that the New Rite of Mass is only a revision of the immemorial Roman Rite. This is quite simply not true. The author of the New Mass was Annibale Bugnini and the bureaucrats who worked under him. Concerning the New Rite, Bugnini himself said: "It is not simply a question of restoring a valuable masterpiece but in some cases it will be necessary to provide new structures for entire rites...it will be a truly new creation..."26 Likewise Joseph Gelineau S.J. : "Let them compare it with the Mass we now have. Not only the words, the melodies and some of the gestures are different. To tell the truth, it is a different liturgy of the Mass. This needs to be said without ambiguity: the Roman Rite as we knew it no longer exists. It has been destroyed. Some walls of the former edifice have fallen while others have changed their appearance, to the extent that it appears today either as a ruin or the partial substructure of a different building" For those who are not familiar with the name of Joseph Gelineau, Michael Davies provides the following information: Father Gelineau was present at the Council as a liturgical expert. He performed the same function after the Council for the CONSILIUM, the commission set up to implement the Constitution." It is a matter beyond any reasonable dispute that the Novus Ordo Missae is a new rite of Mass, as different from the Roman Rite as the Roman Rite is different from the Byzantine Rite. The authors of the New Rite have explicitly stated this. What further need have we of proof when they themselves admit so much, and are therefore judged by the words of their own mouths? In a well known quotation, Paul VI lamented the fact that the Church seemed to be undergoing its own self demolition. He was not alone in giving expression to this belief. Valerian Cardinal Gracias made the same observation when he said that "The Church is being threatened by a real disintegration which is taking place within..." The Modernist Apostasy has been greatly aided in the nurturing of this process by the replacement of the traditional liturgy by the New Mass. The Council of Trent, as the Critical Study on the New Mass presented to Paul VI by Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci explains, "by fixing definitively the "canons" of the rite, erected an insurmountable barrier against any heresy which might attack the integrity of the mystery." In the post-conciliar Church, that barrier has been torn down, and with it has been demolished the most powerful bulwark of defense against the Modernist Heresy, the most deadly enemy our Faith has ever faced. 27 28 This article has been written in response to Cardinal Ratzinger's call for an examination of conscience. I would therefore like to conclude this essay with a portion of a page from Davies which presents Cardinal Ratzinger's own observation about the present state of the Church: How could it be that a Council which was intended to inaugurate an era of renewal was, in fact, followed by a period of what Cardinal Gracias described only too accurately as "a real disintegration"? That this is indeed the case was observed by the outstanding French theologian and liturgist, Father Louis Bouyer, who was an expert adviser at the Council. "Unless we are blind," he remarked, "we must even state bluntly that what we see looks less like the hoped-for regeneration of Catholicism than its accelerated decomposition."29 There are, of course, many in the Church today who prefer not to face up to the reality of what is taking place by closing their eyes. Many bishops, alas, are numbered among them. In 1985, an Extraordinary Synod took place in Rome...In many cases...the bishops claimed that the hoped for renewal had indeed taken place, and that the Church was flourishing as never before; and they said this despite the fact that every available piece of statistically verifiable evidence pointed to the opposite conclusion. There was considerable animosity manifested by European bishops toward Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who had admitted frankly that "it is incontrovertible that this period has definitely been unfavourable for the Catholic Church." 30 FOOTNOTES N.B. THERE IS A SLIGHT PROBLEM WITH THE ORDER OF THE FOOTNOTES. 1- Silvio Cardinal Oddi, Camerlengo of the Sacred College, made this statement to Michael de Jaeghere in an interview published in the first week of August 1988 in Valeurs Actuelles. 2- This quotation appeared in Fr. Byron Houghton's book, MITRE AND CROOK, and is reproduced at length below. 3- Address of Cardinal Ratzinger to the Bishops of Chile, July 13, 1988; Santiago, Chile. Published in Italian in the July 30 - Aug. 5 edition of Il Sabato, and in English by The Wanderer, Sept. 8, 1988. 4- SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, par. 50. 5- ibid., par. 4. 6- ibid., par. 23. 7- ibid., par. 21. 8- cf. Davies, THE TRIDENTINE MASS, p. 21; The Tablet, 24 July, 1971, p.724. 9- Fr. Adrian Fortescue, THE MASS, London, 1917, p. 173. 10- ibid., p.213. 11- Davies, THE ETERNAL SACRIFICE; Long Prairie, 1987, p. 14. 12- D 942. 13- A MANUAL OF CATHOLIC THEOLOGY, Joseph Wilhelm and Thomas Scannell, Kegan Paul:London, 1909. 14- It must be recalled that it pertains to the very essence of the law that it: 1) Must be preceptive in its wording if it is going to make something obligatory. 2) It must specify who are the subjects of the law, and it must specify where and when the law will be in force. 3) The law must be publicly promulgated in the manner specified by law, by the competent authority. It is manifestly evident from the above considerations that Pope Paul's Missale Romanum did not make the new Mass obligatory. 15- Mt. 16:19. 16- This raises the important legal question regarding the validity of the authorization for the use of the new Missal. Pope Paul VI only approved the text for the new Missal, but he himself never formally authorized its use, nor did he derogate those provisions of QUO PRIMUM which explicitly proscribe the use of any missal other than the Tridentine Missal. Now only the Pope himself is juridically competent to validly enact such legislation whose validity requires the exercise of the full plenitude of the power of the keys, and consequently the use of the new Missal of Paul VI remains legally irregular to this day. 17- Davies, THE LEGAL STATUS OF THE TRIDENTINE MASS, Dickinson, 1982, p.35. 18- From a strict legal viewpoint which Canon Law requires in such matters (can. 18), it can be seen that Pope Paul VI only derogated those provisions which prohibited the publication of any new missal; but since Missale Romanum nowhere authorizes the use of the new Missal, none of its nonobstat provisions has derogated the decrees which prohibit the use of any missal other than the Tridentine Missal. 19- Legislation that abrogates explicitly abolishes previous legislation, whereas legislation that obrogates replaces what was there before it. Legislation that derogates leaves the previous legislation in force while nullifying some of its provisions. No Pope has abolished QUO PRIMUM, and therefore it is not abrogated; no Pope has formally mandated the use of the new Missal by a legislative decree, therefore QUO PRIMUM is not obrogated. 20- cf. Can. 751. N.B.It is the teaching of both Suarez and Cardinal Torquemada that by the attempt to suppress the traditional liturgy of the Church, one falls into schism. Cardinal Juan de Torquemada O.P., 1388-1468; Commentarii in Decretum Gratiani (1519), and Summa de Ecclesia (1489): In this way, the Pope could, without doubt, fall into Schism...Especially is this true with regard to the divine liturgy, as for example, if he did not wish personally to follow the universal customs and rites of the Church.... Thus it is that Innocent states (De Consuetudine) that, it is necessary to obey a Pope in all things as long as he does not himself go against the universal customs of the Church, but should he go against the universal customs of the Church, he need not be followed...." Francisco Suarez S.J., 1548-1617, called by Pope Paul V "Doctor Eximius et Pius" (Excellent and Pius Doctor), usually considered the greatest theologian of the Society of Jesus: A Pope "falls into Schism if he departs himself from the body of the Church by refusing to be in communion with her.... The Pope can become a schismatic in this manner if he does not wish to be in proper communion with the body of the Church, a situation which would arise if he tried to excommunicate the entire Church, or, as both Cajetan and Torquemada observe, if he wished to change all the ecclesiastical ceremonies, founded as they are on Apostolic Tradition." 21- Davies, POPE PAUL'S NEW MASS, p.351: "The new Eucharistic Prayers, those introduced in 1968, and all those which have followed since, were not required for the good of the Church and certainly did not grow organically from forms already existing within the Catholic Church. They thus constitute an act of disobedience to the Council and corroborate Father Bouyer's claim that there is formal opposition between the liturgy we have and what the Council worked out." (Louis Bouyer, THE DECOMPOSITION OF CATHOLICISM, London, 1970, p.99.) 22- SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM, par. 21. 23- Canon George Smith, THE TEACHING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, p. 1056. 24- A VINDICATION OF THE BULL APOSTOLICAE CURAE (London, 1898), pp. 42-43. 25- Rev.Greg. 1937, p. 79. 26- La Documentation Catholique, no. 1493, 7 May 1967. 27- Cf. POPE PAUL'S NEW MASS, p.78., Demain la Liturgie, Paris, 1977, p.10 28- Our Lady of La Salette revealed to Melanie that Rome would lose the Faith and become the seat of the Antichrist, but first, according to Sacred Scripture, an obstacle must be removed from out of the way: "And now you know what withholdeth, that he may be revealed in his time." (2 Thess. 2:6). The traditional Roman Rite was a barrier against all heresy, but is no longer an obstacle to the modernist and other heretics who have taken liberties with the new Mass. The promoters of the Modernist Apostasy have thus far been able to act in contempt of the Pope's authority, and this seems to usher in what may eventually be the fulfillment of the following verse: "For the mystery of iniquity already worketh; only that he who now holdeth, do hold, until he be taken out of the way" (2 Thess. 2:7). 29- Father Cornelio Fabro, one of the most respected scholars in the Catholic world has stated in his Problematica della Teologia Contemporanea that the present crisis of the Church is mord serious than any crisis in all the past history of the Church. 30- Louis Bouyer, op. cit., p.1. 31- Davies, THE ETERNAL SACRIFICE, p.22. Ratzinger: L'Osservatore Romano (English Edition), 24 Dec. 1984.