Traditionis custodes: Serpents over Fish

Jul 17, 2021 by Jill

by Eric Sammons, Crisis Magazine:

The bomb has been dropped. Today Pope Francis issued his motu proprio Traditionis custodes severely restricting the celebration of the traditional Latin Mass. In effect, it wipes out Pope Benedict’s 14-year-old motu proprio, Summorum Pontificum, which was issued in order to help those faithful who “continued to be attached with such love and affection to the earlier liturgical forms which had deeply shaped their culture and spirit.” Apparently Pope Francis doesn’t think that’s necessary anymore.

I’m not going to analyze the details of the new motu proprio here—you can find that elsewhere. Instead I’d like to share my initial reaction and address the practical impact on pew-sitting Catholics.

One of my first thoughts when reading the Pope’s decree was our Lord’s words, “What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent?” (Luke 11:11) A growing number of Catholics have been asking to be fed by the “fish” of the TLM; now the Holy Father has given them instead a serpent.

These divine words come to mind because I think of all the people I’ve met in recent years who have discovered the traditional Latin Mass and found it to be a source of strength and comfort in their spiritual pilgrimage here on earth. They don’t reject Vatican II; they don’t think they are better than Novus Ordo Catholics; they don’t hate the pope. By and large, they don’t concern themselves with Church politics. They simply love the beauty and reverence and richness of the traditional Latin Mass—a beauty, reverence, and richness they could not find at their local parish.

I also think of my Anglo-Catholic friend, who is considering conversion. He told me that the motu proprio is like “a door slammed in his face.” He has been off-and-on attending the Latin Mass at my parish, and he recognizes its timeless value. But now he hears the leader of the Catholic Church talk about it as if it’s a bad thing, something dangerous that needs to be hidden and locked up in the closet. He knows this isn’t true, and it makes him hesitant to swim the Tiber.

Read here

Read also: Is Pope Francis Leading the Church to a Schism? by Francis X Rocca, Wall Street Journal

‘Scandal,’ ‘bomb,’ ‘cruelty’: Tradition-loving Catholics react to Pope’s Latin Mass restrictions by Dorothy Cummings McLean, LifeSite

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