What makes a Catholic, Catholic? A simple question with a not so simple answer; one that many in the Church today are unwilling to even consider.
Fr. Thomas Stransky discusses the work of the Secretariat for Christian Unity at Vatican II
What makes a Catholic, Catholic?
May 8, 2014
14 Comments
Hi Louie. Thank you. I had a feeling when you took a rather longer than usual break between posts that you had watched the video of Fr. Stransky discussing Nostra Aetate and his role in the Ecumenical group with Cardinal Bea. You can’t watch that video without realizing that what we have been told all along about Vatican II is not the whole truth. Clearly Bea (and John XXIII???) had no intention of using a “hermeneutic of continuity”. He had in mind a new beginning.(Anfang) Or as we said back in the 60s “This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius”. Now, that is not Catholic — whatever it is, it is not Catholic.
Please pardon me for commenting again. I have two observations to make which I would like to share with you. These are quite frightening in the sense that they could only have diabolic origins.
1. Fr. Stransky replies to a question towards the end of the video about the relationship between the Judaism and Christianity. What he is saying is that the ultimate goal of “ecumenism” is that Christianity should be recognized as a Jewish sect. Something that goes along with that is the belief that the Resurrection of Our Lord is just some sort of myth or fable. I recently read an article about an interpretation of the Dead Sea Scrolls that elaborates on this theme.
http://www.ewtn.com/library/SCRIPTUR/DEADSEA.htm
Keep in mind that Cardinal Bea was a biblical scholar and was an advocate of “blblical archaelolgy”. (He worked on an encyclical for Pope Pius XII on this subject — it is mentioned in the video in the Q&A session.)
2. What goes along with the Christianity as Jewish sect theme is that this was only really true in the first 300 years of the Church (or so the story goes). Then along came the evil Emperor Constantine who institutionalized the Church and destroyed the “true Christian Church”. I’m sure you have heard this before because it a very Protestant idea. Except now it is being advocated by bishops and cardinals in the Church! People like Cardinal Kaspar take this for granted although I doubt they would ever say it openly (and Pope Francis???). This is how they justify destroying Catholic Tradition. You see, it isn’t part of the “authentic Church”. For that we have to go back to the first 300 years of Christianity. Once again I refer you to the article on the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Finally, I think it is very enlightening to read what Archbishop Lefebvre has to say about these same events during Vatican II that Fr. Stransky describes.
http://www.sspxasia.com/Documents/Archbishop-Lefebvre/Conference_at_Long_Island.htm
You will see that taking the two together that there is no contradiction.
One last link and then I’m done. Please see this article in America magazine (of the Jesuits) titled “In the Beginning — How the work of Christian unity got started”.
http://americamagazine.org/issue/5152/article/beginning
I’m sure you can recognize in the title an echo of the “Anfang” (beginning) that was the “hermeneutic” of Cardinal Bea and the ecumenical group.
What’s really interesting about this article is how it ties together the ecumenical movement and the religious liberty movement. Here is a quote:
“A private meeting between Dr. Visser ’t Hooft [the first general secretary of the World Council of Churches] and Cardinal Bea took place on Sept. 22, 1960, at a convent in Milan. The local archbishop, Cardinal Giovanni Montini, was in on the plan too. As Pope Paul VI, Montini would guide the council to completion after the death of Pope John XXIII in 1963. In hindsight, the requirement that the meeting be secret seemed “ridiculous,” as Dr. Visser ’t Hooft later noted, but he agreed that the delicate process of establishing relationships could easily have been complicated by public discussion at that point. Dr. Visser ’t Hooft’s first recommendation to Cardinal Bea was that the council must address religious freedom to ensure that future Catholic statements promoting Christian unity would be taken seriously.”
Remember, this is America magazine — not some webpage of a nutty conspiracy theorist who thinks that freemasons are trying to take over the Church…
dear Michael Leon,
your comments are succinct and edifying, please do not be done, your humble request to ask pardon of Mr. V. notwithstanding.
dear Mr.V.,
this was your best vid, IMO. The tragic situation and your addressing of one aspect, {if you will,} of it –free of nonsense, false sentimentality, word play, I could go on. Excellent.
Somehow the implication that Holy Mother Church never dealt with things comes smack to the forehead, often expressed so well by John Vennari, and many others.
Fr. Stransky exhibits full throttle the deadening of faculties of one enmeshed in marxist + new age brew from which the youth must be protected, to repeat my oft lament. How do we do that? Via the SSPX. Today there is no other way.
dear Michael Leon,
thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart, for this link to the Archbishop from 1983. I have actually been looking for it.
I must respectfully disagree that the SSPX is the only way. Though it may be difficult at times to keep the Faith while attending a diocesan parish, it can be done. We can best affect the Church while staying closely aligned with it…unpleasant though it may be. If we look to the Cross, we see that we also must carry our own Cross during these very difficult times.
That being said, I think the liberals or modernists do somehow justify, in their minds, adherence to a “new tradition,” and they still believe that they are Catholic, and that they have been called to help lead the Church in a new direction. I think that this mindset was fostered by the horrors of WWll, but of course the elements were in place before that. What I’m interested in is how they justify their modernist or liberal views. We can tell them that they aren’t thinking with the Church, but they won’t believe it. We have to find a way to reach them and help them to see Truth and reality, which they have lost sight of. Padre Pio once said that the Devil knows how to twist clever minds. How do we get past the evil works of the Devil? And we must remember that God has allowed it to happen….He could have stopped it if He wished. Our Lady of Fatima stressed the need to pray for sinners, which might avert a new and worse war, but that war started anyway (WWll). So we must pray anew for sinners, and the hierarchy, while at the same time stating the timeless Truths of the Church, without compromise.
Fascinating video. I still marvel at the positive spin on ecumenism. I confess after having watched the whole thing to still being puzzled at the need for the Council, it sounds like a formless mess with no mandate.
for consideration:
“————Putting aside, for the moment, the mistake of thinking the SSPX is not already in the heart of the Church, ————–”
http://culbreath.wordpress.com/2014/05/08/on-the-necessity-of-the-sspx/
Michael Leon,
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I agree with your comment about how the protestant notion that the catholic church was somehow corrupted after the edict of Milan by Constantine is being used by liberal “Catholics” to undermine the faith. In Spain the horrible “Neo-catechumenal Way” sect, founded by Kiko Arguello (fully supported, by the way by “St” JP II “The Great” and B XVI “The Great Restorer of Tradition”) precisely holds to and promotes such a view.
I just read about the Neocatechumenal Way in Wiki, sect is the right word. I guess I can see why JPII would approve, with his proven taste for cults witnessed by Assisi.
‘sentire cum Ecclesia’, niether deceiving nor being deceived but holding to the charity of Truth.
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Pius XII Mediator Dei condemned antiquarianism (the idea that the ‘church’ was corrupted from the 4th century until luther?!? came along to ‘make things new’); the very antiquarianism that VII obviously used as a lever to overthrow a 1900 years of Holy Ghost wrought Truth. Fr Cekada’s ‘Work of Human Hands’, is an excellent resource for what the vii popes actually did, before they held office and during, to the Mass and thereby the Faith. (p.s. put aside sv ‘prejudice’, and in a ‘spirit of ecumenism’, ‘charitably’ read it, it is well worth the read (though probably more disturbing for those of us in the novus ordo wastelands – ah the fruits of vii).
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p.s. I guess Benedict XVI’s ‘hermeneutic of continuity’, only goes back to ’62.
“Pius XII Mediator Dei condemned antiquarianism (the idea that the ‘church’ was corrupted from the 4th century until luther?!? came along to ‘make things new’)”
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Here is the context:
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“60. The use of the Latin language, customary in a considerable portion of the Church, is a manifest and beautiful sign of unity, as well as an effective antidote for any corruption of doctrinal truth. In spite of this, the use of the mother tongue in connection with several of the rites may be of much advantage to the people. But the Apostolic See alone is empowered to grant this permission. It is forbidden, therefore, to take any action whatever of this nature without having requested and obtained such consent, since the sacred liturgy, as We have said, is entirely subject to the discretion and approval of the Holy See.
61. The same reasoning holds in the case of some persons who are bent on the restoration of all the ancient rites and ceremonies indiscriminately. The liturgy of the early ages is most certainly worthy of all veneration. But ancient usage must not be esteemed more suitable and proper, either in its own right or in its significance for later times and new situations, on the simple ground that it carries the savor and aroma of antiquity. The more recent liturgical rites likewise deserve reverence and respect. They, too, owe their inspiration to the Holy Spirit, who assists the Church in every age even to the consummation of the world.[52] They are equally the resources used by the majestic Spouse of Jesus Christ to promote and procure the sanctity of man.
62. Assuredly it is a wise and most laudable thing to return in spirit and affection to the sources of the sacred liturgy. For research in this field of study, by tracing it back to its origins, contributes valuable assistance towards a more thorough and careful investigation of the significance of feast-days, and of the meaning of the texts and sacred ceremonies employed on their occasion. But it is neither wise nor laudable to reduce everything to antiquity by every possible device. Thus, to cite some instances, one would be straying from the straight path were he to wish the altar restored to its primitive tableform; were he to want black excluded as a color for the liturgical vestments; were he to forbid the use of sacred images and statues in Churches; were he to order the crucifix so designed that the divine Redeemer’s body shows no trace of His cruel sufferings; and lastly were he to disdain and reject polyphonic music or singing in parts, even where it conforms to regulations issued by the Holy See.
63. Clearly no sincere Catholic can refuse to accept the formulation of Christian doctrine more recently elaborated and proclaimed as dogmas by the Church, under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit with abundant fruit for souls, because it pleases him to hark back to the old formulas. No more can any Catholic in his right senses repudiate existing legislation of the Church to revert to prescriptions based on the earliest sources of canon law. Just as obviously unwise and mistaken is the zeal of one who in matters liturgical would go back to the rites and usage of antiquity, discarding the new patterns introduced by disposition of divine Providence to meet the changes of circumstances and situation.
64. This way of acting bids fair to revive the exaggerated and senseless antiquarianism to which the illegal Council of Pistoia gave rise. It likewise attempts to reinstate a series of errors which were responsible for the calling of that meeting as well as for those resulting from it, with grievous harm to souls, and which the Church, the ever watchful guardian of the “deposit of faith” committed to her charge by her divine Founder, had every right and reason to condemn.[53] For perverse designs and ventures of this sort tend to paralyze and weaken that process of sanctification by which the sacred liturgy directs the sons of adoption to their Heavenly Father of their souls’ salvation.”
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http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xii/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xii_enc_20111947_mediator-dei_en.html
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## IOW, the reference is to liturgical antiquarianism, of a particular kind. It is equally important to see what Ven. Pius XII was *not* condemning. Hope that helps.
One thought struck me.
The Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to St.John
14:1 Let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me.
14:2 In my Father’s house there are many mansions. If not, I would have told you: because I go to prepare a place for you.
14:3 And if I shall go, and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will take you to myself; that where I am, you also may be.
14:4 And whither I go you know, and the way you know