www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Are we in union even with these people?

Memo, bless your heart. I have also tried to defend Cardinal Mahoney with little success.

Now this is not to say that he always does things right - there are many things I disagree with this Cardinal about! However, to give him his due, whenever I attend Mass at the Cathedral I always find it is done correctly, reverently and with NO ad-libs or "hey, look at me!!!" actions by the priests.

Certainly there are things I would like to see changed or done differently - but I don't have the authority to change things. Like the laity throughout the past, oh, 2,000 years or so, I will just have to endure the bishops God has chosen to give us, and pray to be deserving of better ones in the future.

Dear Brian,

Like priests don't mumble/rush through prayers in the NO Mass also? Furthermore, the Mass of Pius X was longer than the novus ordo. Come on!

And it's ridiculous to even try to put "mumbling and/or rushing through of prayers" in the same category as what I saw in that video clip-- or what I've seen at almost every novus ordo Mass I ever took part in, for that matter.

The problem is with both with the formation of priests and with the novus ordo Mass itself.

What is even more disturbing to me than Cirque Du Mahony is that there are some Catholics who are actually trying to DEFEND it, presumably out of some twisted sense of "obedience."

God bless,

Karen

I have lots of random thought regarding the garbage posts that I have just read. Here are a few of them:

Liturgical Dancing, isn't that when supposed Catholics dance around the topic of impius Liturgy? (perhaps even defend it)

Bishops, Priests, etc. lose their authority when they fail to teach the Orthodox Faith. Obedience is VERY important. However, if my Priest or Bishop told me to hop in bed with my brother's wife (or some such sin), I'd darn well better not do it. Likewise, if the Hierarchs issue decrees making Unholy liturgy the norm, just because sin is normal we aren't bound to obey it. Christos Voskrese! Christos Anesti! Christos a inviat! Christ is Risen!

Why do we spend so much time talking about a liturgy that everyone knows is full wrong practices and void of many good practices that belongin the liturgy?

Ah, Incog, I always enjoy your "random thoughts." They are always funny yet sadly realistic.

God bless,

Karen

The liturgical disintegration in LA appears to be accelerating.

Truly a sad state of affairs.

I wonder if it is time to close this thread. I think the point has been made that BCs would not like to have a liturgy like that. Could we move to something else?

CDL

The link below is to an article by Dr. Lauren Pristas on the 1960s reform of the Roman Missal:

Theological Principles that Guided the Redaction of the Roman Missal (1970) [thomist.org]

Hi,

When you have an Archdiocese-wide event in Los Angeles, no "cultural element" that could be allowed in the Liturgy is out of place, for this is perhaps the most cosmopolitan Catholic jurisdiction in the world.

We have at least one parish in which Mass is celebrated in no less than 6 langages every weekend (one Mass each language).

Bilingual and Trilingual parishes are abundant.

The Closing Liturgy for the RE Congress was a multi-cultural event.

The Readings were proclaimed in Vietnamese, Spanish and English. We had music in those three languages plus some Tagalog and something else, perhaps Zwahili, but I am not sure.

A good number of the cultures represented there have dacing at the core of their traditional spirituality. Hispanics, to begin with.

Again, I was there and I never perceived any "worship me" attitude from any of the celebrants or any of the other liturgical ministers (deacons, readers, musicians, singers, dancers, altar servers, etc.).

And with all due respect, I do know what I am talking about. Right now my wife and I are right in the middle of an effort to have a priest from one of our parishes, who does abuse the Liturgy, either fraternally corrected or disciplined.

To follow the decisions of the Cardinal Archbishop is not a twisted sense of obedience. I find it more twisted to pick and chose what I want to follow, because I know better than the Church hierarchy.

But the bottom line is this: I was there, and I worshiped God during this Liturgy, together with thousands of my fellow Religious Educators, dozens of Deacons and Priests, a dozen Bishops, successors of the apostles and my Metropolitan Archbishop, a Cardinal and Prince of the Church.

You were not there, and I am not convinced your expressions of disgust in this forum give God any glory or honor.

Shalom,
Memo

Memo,

I honestly don't think that the fact that this was a "special" event necessarily mitigates the fact that this Mass was a travesty of immodesty and liturgical abuse.

Another point which should be made to your rebuttal is this. It does not matter what other cultures were represented at this liturgy. Nor does it matter what the cultural norms may be in the countries of their origins. The fact remains that this Mass took place in the US. And thus it is subject to the norms of the GIRM and US Council of Catholic Bishops.

There were things shown in this video that are contrary to both the General Instruction of the Roman Missal and the USCCB.

So it does not matter one whit what cultures were represented there.

I'm sorry to say that we are in complete disagreement here. There is never any excuse for such blatant disregard for the Body and Blood of Christ.

Carole

Memo,

I was not there so I can't comment on it definitively. But, let me ask, what culture was the dance representing?

Contemporary "Angelino".

Which is a mixture of everything on God's good earth, with a pinch of locally grown spice.

So the answer is that this Liturgical dance doesn't reflect any particular ancient dancing style.

But as I've said regarding traditions: Not everything old is good and not everything new is better.

I think you'll find this same line of thought in many places in the contemporary Latin Church.

We do not like innovation for the sake of innovation, but we are not afraid of change or of trying out new ideas.

We understand our spiritual heritage did not stop growing 1500 years ago or 500 years ago. Our spiritual heritage is a living thing, still growing and developing and it is our responsibility to add our own contributions, not only for our sake, but for the sake of generations of Latin Catholics to come and for the enrichment of the entire Universal Church.

Shalom,
Memo

Memo, that isn't what the Liturgical norms for the Latin Church allow. It isn't to develop a dance to make it a tradition, but to allow dance which is already a part of one's religious tradition to be incorporated (i.e. the Ethiopian culture, the Byzantine walk around the altar, the processions with women carrying incense in India, the use of Native processional forms, etc)

I think it is a mistake to make the Liturgy represent the culture of the people. The Roman Liturgy had something supra-cultural about it. Although it is Roman it is not reflective so much of the Italian culture. Gregorian chant doesn't sound like Italian music, etc.

By 'un-binding' the Roman Liturgy of it's particular tradition, authentic Liturgy is now bound up, subservient to the whims of those who think they represent a given culture. I've been to spanish Masses offered by liberal 'anglo' priests. I remember one such priest on the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe wearing a Mexican pancho in place of the priestly chasuble and using a ceramic 'chalice' and wicker basket instead of the golden paten. I guess he that that he was being sensitive to Hispanic culture. Quite the contrary. After the Mass a Mexican national told me that in Mexico the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe is a great holy day, and even in the smaller town it is celebrated with great solemnity with gold or silver vestments, in other words with the best they had. Some of this multi-cultural stuff is actually very condescending and based on stereo-types.

Lazareno,

That is what I mean. The authentic Tradition was not being used at this liturgy, yet some pseudo-thing was made to take its place. It's the difference between real Mexican food and Taco Bell. I think allowing the authentic Culture to influence the liturgy and vis versa *can* be positive (a natural outgrowth), but creating a previously non-existant practice and calling it tradition is as authentic as Taco Bell.

Hi,

Hmmm... I do not think we are understanding each other.

I am not saying that the Latin Church is now trying to impose dance as part of the religious expressions of her members.

As you say, dancing is already part of those expressions for a number of cultures, many of which are very well represented in the very cosmopolitan Latin Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

The particular style of dancing will change with time and that is what I was trying to say.

The dance style that is prevalent in the (still rare) occasions in which it is used for the Liturgy doesn't follw any particular ancient style for any single particular culture.

The style of dancing is contemporary. But the relationship between dancing and worship was already there.

I will not assume you agree with me in that this approach is OK, but at least I hope you understand better what my position is.

Blessings!

Shalom,
Memo