www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Modernism in Eastern Catholicism or Orthodoxy?

I would hardly say that communion in the hand is modern, it is a return to the ancient practice of the Church, it is more like a restoration than an innovation. Cf. St John Chrysostoms instrution as to how to reverently receive the Eucharist.
Stephanos I

In my neck of the woods I see LOTS of rosaries--only they are hanging from the dashboard mirror in cars. Now, if only they were in their owner's hands instead!!

In Christ,
Alice

"Teilhard de Chardin" (sprinkling holy water around as liberally as he can.)


Oh, how gently and generously you do speak, Deacon Robert!

You seek the Catholic equivalent of the cell phone?

I understand, but those are probably extreme examples. I think the fact is in many ways the church has accepted the views of the modern world. Often without us even thinking about it or recognizing such changes.

Certainly the churches have accepted certain modern ideas such as the necessity of religious freedom. The Church ought to accept such ideas. Not everything that is modern is evil. Supporting religious freedom is a good thing, whereas denying the resurrection of Christ or the reality of Christ's presence in the Eucharist is not.

Joe

I consider that Dn. Robert's assessment is correct.

Pope St.Pius X recognized and defined the evil, but his efforts
to surpress it were unsuccessful. It merely went underground.
It is obvious that a great many in the Church fell prey to it,
particularly among our "intellectuals",
many of whom, again, would naturally rise to high positions as long as they kept their
true opinions quiet. How else are we to explain the devastating
aftrmath of VatII. (I say nothing against VatII except that
the Fathers displayed a certain over-optimism about human
nature. Neither do I say anything against Pope Paul, except that
he was not the man to cope with the situation.)

The secret modernists within the Church seized the occasion to
hijack the Council and promote not its agenda, but their own.
It was a blitzkreig and a very successful one.That it was so
successful is evidence of how numerous and in what high places
the "moles" were. I must believe that a great many other clerics
and religious who cooperated with them did so in good faith,
thinking that the agenda being presented to them was what the
Council had intended, since that was what they were being told.
Perhaps the natural human itch for novelty and desire to appear
more "with it" to the world made things more attractive to them.

(Who can doubt that the Enemy, disguised as "an angel of light"
played a great part in all this?)

Consider the Novus Ordo - a term
I must use for want of better and the focus of so much discontent
and heart-burning among
Catholics. An exchange with a poster on another site led me to
revisit Denis Crouan's "The Liturgy Betrayed" (Ignatius Press,
1997). Crouan is French and it seems the liturgical situation
in France at that time was worse than our own.

Crouan examines in brief detail what changes were made to the
Roman Missal after VatII and why they were made. He concludes
that the Novus Ordo is a true and faithful development of the
Roman Missal and that what was done to the Mass was the same
sort of thing as was done in the time of St. Pius V: ridding it
of unnecessary baggage and restoring items that had dropped out -
the Prayer of the Faithful, for example. In fact, he maintains
that the Novus Order is virtually identical to the pontifical
Mass of the 8th Century and to the Carthusian Rite.(One might
disagree in detail with some of Crouan's conclusions.I myself
think that the work was done too hastily and that the Novus
Ordo needs some tweaking).

Crouan futher argues that the problem is that the Novus Ordo
is almost never celebrated according to the Norms (except, in
France, at a few monasteries). What the faithful get instead
are Masses designed by individual priests or liturgical
committees, parochial or diocesan, which Masses those in the
pews are told are the Novus Ordo, while in fact, they ain't.

What we have to deal with, then, is not a defective form of the
Mass, but infidelity and disobedience on the part of bishops
and priests. (In France, disobedience on the part of bishops
seems to be particularly virulent).This is what we have been
seeing in America, as well. There is nothing to prevent a priest
from saying the Novus Ordo well (I have seen it done) but how
often does he?

The priest can face ad orientem; he can sing the Mass; he
can use Latin; he can promote the use of Gregorian Chant;
he can say Mass solemly without jokes, jabber, little
comments and explanations; he can follow the text of the
Mass without changing, adding or deleting anything; he
can ensure that appropriate music and hymns are used;
he can use incense; he can (at least try) to train his
lectors and acolytes and Eucharistic Ministers to do their
jobs with appropriate competence, devotion and solemnity;
he can put the tabernacle back where it belongs; he can
put back the Stations and the kneelers if they are wanting.
(Many other "cans" will occur to you.)What's to stop him?


Fr. Benedict Groshel says in a tape of his that the situation
was complicated by poor priestly formation in liturgy in the
pre-VatII Church,at least in America. The seminarians were not
trained in Liturgy, they were trained in Rubrics. Hence the
15 minute "Tridentine" Masses. So long as you had the right
intention, said all the right words and made all the right
gestures the Mass was "valid" and that was all that was
needed. Liurgical Piety had nothing to do with it. If priestly
formation was defective before the Council, what chance was
there of improvement afterwards?

Another important factor was the quality of the translations
provided by the ICEL. This, we may hope, will be corrected in
the near future.

What applies to the ill-performance of the Mass applies as
well to that of the Sacraments and devotions of the Church.

Yet somehow the Holy Spirit is working through all this to bring
good out of evil. I have heard priests complain that today's
seminarians are "too conservative"! Dear me, how dreadful!

The Church has been through a great many crises. In fact, looking
at history,it always seems to be in one crisis or another.
Look at the 10th Century, or the 15th. Things have been much
worse. Our Lord tells us that the gates of hell shall not
prevail against the Church. He never said that they might not
seem to be coming pretty close to prevailing. They often have.
But God is with us - we wouldn't be here if He weren't.

Edmac

Good post, Edmac!

Dn. Robert

I must confess that it is still unclear to me what specific "modernist" teachings are found in Orthodoxy. Can anyone give any examples?

Joe

In some cases it has I would say against its own will, but accept them it has. In many ways I think the supremacy of conscience issue is central to a good deal of this, but that in itself is probably a modern idea.


I would agree, the reason I raise the issue is once you begin accepting the precepts of modernity, it is difficult to contain the spread of its influence. The genie is out of the lamp so to speak.


I would say the extreme traditionalist groups that defiantly reject modernity would not agree with that statement.

In my opinion, there aren't any, when you analyze things in light of the true definition of Modernism, which is nothing more than religious subjectivism. To the Modernist, religion is not a matter of objective reality, but of "funny inner feelings"; i.e., "my truth is my truth, and your truth is your truth". This is a Western virus, rooted in the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment. If there are Orthodox clerics or laity who are into this stuff, it's because they've been influenced by unfortunate Westerners.

Dn. Robert

Dear Father Deacon,

When we were discussing Modernism in my religion class, one of my students said that Catholicism could be seen as being "Modernist" since it was based on the "funny inner feelings" of the Pope!

Alex

Religious freedom? Is anyone prepared to argue against that?


Edmac

Modernism in Orthodoxy as far as laity go, it is the same as modernism in Catholicism - complete laxity and indifference, a disconnect between Church attendance and implementing those teachings into life.

Our 'Catholic' politicians are a good example.. the 'Orthodox' ones are not too far behind..

There's nothing very modern about laxity and indifference.
St. Paul seems to have had some issues with them quite a while
ago.

Edmac