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Post by tisbearself on Jul 6, 2023 17:52:03 GMT
Let's say the OF declined into nonexistence. I would be willing to bet money that the Catholics who were motivated enough to go to the TLM will still be showing up for Mass.
That's what probably really scares the anti-TLM clerics. The most committed practitioners of the faith, the ones most likely to attend Mass and produce vocations, are the allegedly "rigid" TLM bunch. Oh, the horror!
And if I'm wrong, then I challenge the OF supporters to start cranking out a big batch of newly minted priests. It would be great if they did, we need priests. It ain't happening yet though.
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Post by farronwolf on Jul 6, 2023 19:04:03 GMT
Does anyone have any numbers on vocations coming out of NO parishes vs TLM parishes? The only real growth in the US has been among Deacons in the past 40 years or so. The number of Catholic schools has declined, the number of marriages has declined, and therefore the number of annulments as well. Seminarian rates have remained low, but pretty consistent over the past 40 or so years. For all we know, the large increase in numbers of priests in the 1940-1960 time period could have been a result of the Great Depression and World Wars that were fought during that time. Maybe men of that era saw a field in which there was stability, guaranteed housing, meals and retirement of some sort. There are many, many factors which may or may not have come into play resulting in the increase or decline of the priesthood and religious. faithsurvey.co.uk/american-catholic-statistics.html
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Post by tisbearself on Jul 6, 2023 20:46:54 GMT
I don't have numbers, but even if I did, people would poke holes in them by saying things like "how many of those young men will still be priests, or with their orders, in 10 years?" Obviously this is a question no one can answer right now and it depends on many factors outside the scope of this discussion. Also, at this point most young men who are drawn to traditional Latin Mass or some similar Latin rite (Carmelite Rite, Dominican Rite etc) will be seeking to join an order, because Traditionis custodes made it more difficult for a diocesan priest to get permission to even say TLM and assuming he somehow could get that permission, it might be revoked later. Whereas if you join FSSP or ICKSP, your charism involves saying TLM and short of doing away with your order, it can't really be restricted. But all of this is beside the point. The number of Catholics interested in TLM, though they are stalwart, is small. You will need tons of OF-saying parish priests in any event, if the Church is to continue. There are whole countries that once were Catholic and currently are ordaining very few new priests. France ordained 88 priests this year, a big decline. euro.dayfr.com/local/426581.htmlIreland only has 20 men in seminary to serve the dioceses of the whole country, down from the 1970s when it had 500. m.independent.ie/irish-news/just-20-seminarians-now-studying-to-become-catholic-priests-for-irelands-26-dioceses/a442824989.html#Do I think that switching to TLM would magically get these numbers way up? No, maybe you'd get a 10 or 20 percent increase, but it would still be helpful because clearly we need every priest we can get. So, why would the Church go around actively alienating that 10 or 20 percent? From a pure business management standpoint, it makes no sense. Then again, from a pure business managememt standpoint, the Church in recent years and probably decades has done a whole bunch of incompetent things. I don't really expect otherwise at this point. I am however quite confident that when the Church gets down to its remnant, a healthy percentage of that remnant will be trads. They're the most interested in Church. And they're getting tons of practice being a remnant already.
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Post by ralfy on Jul 7, 2023 0:27:08 GMT
To recap, what is "traditional" and what is "pure"? It turns out that what's considered "traditional" (like the use of Latin) was actually modern then (because more did not speak Aramaic or Greek), and what's considered modern now (like the OF and the use of vernacular languages) turns out to be based on early practices of the Church (like communal practices and even Communion in the hand, as well as the use of the vernacular).
What about "brutality"? I recall as a Catholic school child of being told about eternal damnation, but they were told by older priests after Vatican II. Meanwhile, it was not emphasized by younger priests because they talked about the faith confronting current brutalities globally, like summary executions, villages destroyed by paramilitary forces, low intensity conflict against even basic Christian communities, Lumen gentium, liberation theology, and so on. And all those involved a Church that was using the OF and vernacular languages.
Given that, what happened? There was not only a profound shift in the Church, there was also a profound shift in the world. When Vatican II came about, so did national liberation fronts on a global scale. That coupled with increasing prosperity among those both during and after WWII, modern views of the Church that predated VII (like emphasizing the study of the Bible and advancing Bible scholarship even among lay persons), the rise of the Global South, incredible advancements in science and technology, a twentyfold increase in armaments production and deployment worldwide, the proliferation of proxy wars and realpolitik leading to accommodations made between military powers, structural adjustment and low intensity conflicts, limits to growth, and growing awareness of not only environmental collapse but also of this new thing called "global warming", led more people worldwide not only to be aware of global predicaments but also to become more critical not only of the Church but of religions in general, science, governments, and themselves.
In a way, it wasn't so much that the idea of sin and hell were not only set aside and ignored because of prosperity, they've also become actualized as the same prosperity has led to damage to societies and ecosystems, and in incredible ways: limits to growth coupled with pollution vs. the intense drive for economic growth leading to increasing conflict and "black swans" like proxy wars and even pandemics.
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Post by homeschooldad on Jul 7, 2023 1:08:07 GMT
I don't have numbers, but even if I did, people would poke holes in them by saying things like "how many of those young men will still be priests, or with their orders, in 10 years?" Obviously this is a question no one can answer right now and it depends on many factors outside the scope of this discussion. Also, at this point most young men who are drawn to traditional Latin Mass or some similar Latin rite (Carmelite Rite, Dominican Rite etc) will be seeking to join an order, because Traditionis custodes made it more difficult for a diocesan priest to get permission to even say TLM and assuming he somehow could get that permission, it might be revoked later. Whereas if you join FSSP or ICKSP, your charism involves saying TLM and short of doing away with your order, it can't really be restricted. But all of this is beside the point. The number of Catholics interested in TLM, though they are stalwart, is small. You will need tons of OF-saying parish priests in any event, if the Church is to continue. There are whole countries that once were Catholic and currently are ordaining very few new priests. France ordained 88 priests this year, a big decline. euro.dayfr.com/local/426581.htmlIreland only has 20 men in seminary to serve the dioceses of the whole country, down from the 1970s when it had 500. m.independent.ie/irish-news/just-20-seminarians-now-studying-to-become-catholic-priests-for-irelands-26-dioceses/a442824989.html#Do I think that switching to TLM would magically get these numbers way up? No, maybe you'd get a 10 or 20 percent increase, but it would still be helpful because clearly we need every priest we can get. So, why would the Church go around actively alienating that 10 or 20 percent? From a pure business management standpoint, it makes no sense. Then again, from a pure business managememt standpoint, the Church in recent years and probably decades has done a whole bunch of incompetent things. I don't really expect otherwise at this point. I am however quite confident that when the Church gets down to its remnant, a healthy percentage of that remnant will be trads. They're the most interested in Church. And they're getting tons of practice being a remnant already. It's pretty clear, Rome is afraid that the traditionalists will take over, at least in certain Western countries. Pope Francis himself admits that the movement is growing. And, yes, the people are stalwart. You don't get much more "skin in the game" than becoming a priest or religious on the one hand, or committing to a large family (which traditionalists tend to have) on the other. You would think that a "listening" Church, an "accompanying" Church, a liberal and tolerant Church --- isn't that what all this synod stuff is all about? --- would realize that these sheep have a smell too, and make like Phil Donahue 1 or someone, ask itself "what exactly is it about the Novus Ordo, or suppression of the TLM, or even Vatican II itself, that bothers these people so much? --- could the problem lie more with us, and not so much with them?". 1An American talk-show host who was, there's no kind way to say this, pretty much of a simp. He was known for being "sensitive".
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Post by tisbearself on Jul 7, 2023 2:36:25 GMT
The fear makes no sense to me. Trads aren’t scary. And a significant number of them are “tradismatic”, half trad and half charismatic, so it’s not like they’re all stolidly back in 1949 or whatever.
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Post by homeschooldad on Jul 7, 2023 17:00:30 GMT
The fear makes no sense to me. Trads aren’t scary. And a significant number of them are “tradismatic”, half trad and half charismatic, so it’s not like they’re all stolidly back in 1949 or whatever. It's very scary to those who want to start the Church's history in 1962, and who realize that an appeal to past approaches and practices resonates with people who become aware of it. They don't want you asking questions. Just accept and obey what you're told right now. If present approaches and practices seem to have something "wrong" with them, that may be a sign that they're not so good after all. You would think that a liberal, tolerant, "listening" Church would ask "is there some sort of problem with the post-Vatican II Church, that would make people feel this way?". Just the other day, I had the TV on, and a rerun of Gilligan's Island --- Gilligan's Island! --- had a disclaimer saying that the show reflected attitudes of its time. I have to wonder if ardent adherents of "presentism" would like to see similar disclaimers on pre-Vatican II books, maybe a warning label on the cover? Of course, then, people would ask "why are they different?", a kind of "Streisand Effect".
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Post by homeschooldad on Jul 7, 2023 17:06:54 GMT
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Post by farronwolf on Jul 7, 2023 17:10:43 GMT
It's very scary to those who want to start the Church's history in 1570, and who realize that an appeal to past approaches and practices resonates with people who become aware of it.
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Post by homeschooldad on Jul 7, 2023 17:37:14 GMT
It's very scary to those who want to start the Church's history in 1570, and who realize that an appeal to past approaches and practices resonates with people who become aware of it. No, that's more what Protestants do --- write off everything from a romanticized "early Church", to the time of Luther and the other "reformers", as an amorphous "Dark Ages" when, to hear them tell it, Christianity was in eclipse and was distorted by an apostate or near-apostate Rome. The basic form of the Traditional Latin Mass goes back much further than 1570. It is essentially the same Mass as in the time of St Gregory the Great. And adherence to Catholic Tradition is about far more than just the Mass.
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Post by tisbearself on Jul 7, 2023 19:25:04 GMT
This idea that allowing TLM means there will be no more Masses in the vernacular and we're going to have another Spanish Inquisition is simply bizarre.
The good news is I don't know any younger Catholics who think that way so I reckon it's an attitude that will fade out as those people age out.
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Post by homeschooldad on Jul 7, 2023 21:00:33 GMT
This idea that allowing TLM means there will be no more Masses in the vernacular and we're going to have another Spanish Inquisition is simply bizarre. The good news is I don't know any younger Catholics who think that way so I reckon it's an attitude that will fade out as those people age out. I don't see that happening. Even if a future traditional Pope were to abrogate the Novus Ordo Missae, the 1962 Missal could be translated into the various vernaculars (there is historical precedent for this), and many if not most things that people like about the Novus Ordo could be retrofitted into the 1962 Missal without doing violence to it in the least. So far as I am aware, the following things could be done: - vernacularization (as noted above)
- establishing a lectionary with additional readings immediately before, or incorporated into, the homily
- a vigorous implementation of the "Dialogue Mass" concept, essentially allowing the laity to say the things that the acolytes say
- reciting the Credo and the Pater Noster in unison (hey, if people want to hold hands or sway back and forth, their call)
- allow the faithful to bring up the gifts for the offertory
- allow external manifestations proper to individual cultures (such as the clapping at the consecration that some Africans see as a display of piety)
- a wider range of culturally appropriate hymns
...and so on. That's not going to happen either, but it's an interesting hypothetical to consider. I would not be a hard Pope to get along with. Far warmer and fuzzier than Jude Law's "Pope Pius XIII".
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Post by ralfy on Jul 8, 2023 7:18:26 GMT
I don't have numbers, but even if I did, people would poke holes in them by saying things like "how many of those young men will still be priests, or with their orders, in 10 years?" Obviously this is a question no one can answer right now and it depends on many factors outside the scope of this discussion. Also, at this point most young men who are drawn to traditional Latin Mass or some similar Latin rite (Carmelite Rite, Dominican Rite etc) will be seeking to join an order, because Traditionis custodes made it more difficult for a diocesan priest to get permission to even say TLM and assuming he somehow could get that permission, it might be revoked later. Whereas if you join FSSP or ICKSP, your charism involves saying TLM and short of doing away with your order, it can't really be restricted. But all of this is beside the point. The number of Catholics interested in TLM, though they are stalwart, is small. You will need tons of OF-saying parish priests in any event, if the Church is to continue. There are whole countries that once were Catholic and currently are ordaining very few new priests. France ordained 88 priests this year, a big decline. euro.dayfr.com/local/426581.htmlIreland only has 20 men in seminary to serve the dioceses of the whole country, down from the 1970s when it had 500. m.independent.ie/irish-news/just-20-seminarians-now-studying-to-become-catholic-priests-for-irelands-26-dioceses/a442824989.html#Do I think that switching to TLM would magically get these numbers way up? No, maybe you'd get a 10 or 20 percent increase, but it would still be helpful because clearly we need every priest we can get. So, why would the Church go around actively alienating that 10 or 20 percent? From a pure business management standpoint, it makes no sense. Then again, from a pure business managememt standpoint, the Church in recent years and probably decades has done a whole bunch of incompetent things. I don't really expect otherwise at this point. I am however quite confident that when the Church gets down to its remnant, a healthy percentage of that remnant will be trads. They're the most interested in Church. And they're getting tons of practice being a remnant already. It's pretty clear, Rome is afraid that the traditionalists will take over, at least in certain Western countries. Pope Francis himself admits that the movement is growing. And, yes, the people are stalwart. You don't get much more "skin in the game" than becoming a priest or religious on the one hand, or committing to a large family (which traditionalists tend to have) on the other. You would think that a "listening" Church, an "accompanying" Church, a liberal and tolerant Church --- isn't that what all this synod stuff is all about? --- would realize that these sheep have a smell too, and make like Phil Donahue 1 or someone, ask itself "what exactly is it about the Novus Ordo, or suppression of the TLM, or even Vatican II itself, that bothers these people so much? --- could the problem lie more with us, and not so much with them?". 1An American talk-show host who was, there's no kind way to say this, pretty much of a simp. He was known for being "sensitive".
"Traditional" has a different meaning outside those areas, and it doesn't involve Latin, the EF, older versions of the Catechism, and even older versions of the Bible. And they also involve big families, but due to other factors.
The problem isn't the EF or the OF, etc., but growing secularism due to growing prosperity, and in relation to that far serious issues affecting the Church, such as sexual and financial abuse.
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Post by ralfy on Jul 8, 2023 7:19:34 GMT
The fear makes no sense to me. Trads aren’t scary. And a significant number of them are “tradismatic”, half trad and half charismatic, so it’s not like they’re all stolidly back in 1949 or whatever. What's notable is that calls for changes took place within the same traditional world. For example, I think the use of the vernacular for the EF was fulfilled during WW2 based on requests from American Catholics.
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Post by ralfy on Jul 8, 2023 7:24:04 GMT
The fear makes no sense to me. Trads aren’t scary. And a significant number of them are “tradismatic”, half trad and half charismatic, so it’s not like they’re all stolidly back in 1949 or whatever. It's very scary to those who want to start the Church's history in 1962, and who realize that an appeal to past approaches and practices resonates with people who become aware of it. They don't want you asking questions. Just accept and obey what you're told right now. If present approaches and practices seem to have something "wrong" with them, that may be a sign that they're not so good after all. You would think that a liberal, tolerant, "listening" Church would ask "is there some sort of problem with the post-Vatican II Church, that would make people feel this way?". Just the other day, I had the TV on, and a rerun of Gilligan's Island --- Gilligan's Island! --- had a disclaimer saying that the show reflected attitudes of its time. I have to wonder if ardent adherents of "presentism" would like to see similar disclaimers on pre-Vatican II books, maybe a warning label on the cover? Of course, then, people would ask "why are they different?", a kind of "Streisand Effect". The irony is that the traditional movement described here is actually based on the same, i.e., an irrational (aesthetic and romantic) view of the past. Hence, the reference to a "nostalgic disease."
Acceptance and obedience is also the reason why the EF was used, and after that the OF.
The problem with using the idea of being liberal and tolerant is that it works both ways. In which case, what succeeds is based on what makes sense. That's why it's not about "presentism."
Also, the last point works against those who insist on the EF because it makes them sound like immature teenagers: they simply want to be "different," and they're hoping that others will copy them just so that they'll be "different," too.
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