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letters
from our readers
An island of orthodoxy
Editor: I greatly appreciated Rev. Anthony Zimmerman's letter last July. He expressed well how influential elected members of religious orders can be, and certainly made a strong point for papal-appointment of religious superiors. Having said that I'd like to point out at least one case where things have been the other way around.
I grew up in Brazil where most of my family still live. My parents, through the years, have suffered greatly under bishops of all sorts, of course all appointed by popes. I do not mean any disrespect or criticism. I admire and love enormously our present pope and realize that I cannot understand how bishops come to get appointed in Brazil. I should also add that some of the best, most outspoken bishops I know of, are Brazilian, and that they do a magnificent job of preserving much of the Catholic faith in that country.
It has been true, however, that my parents have and still do suffer greatly under some bishops' "pastoral" decisions. Great have been the abuses in liturgy and Catholic thought in Brazil since Vatican II. Liberation Theology's birth place, Brazil is still the home of Leonardo Boff who I believe has since left the Church. Like him many have been the priests and bishops in Brazil who have publicly criticized the Church and in this way harmed the faithful.
In the midst of this bleak scenario, there is a Benedictine Abbey in a surprising secluded heart of downtown Rio de Janeiro that has, through the centuries, been a stalwart for true Catholic faith, teachings and liturgy. It is not uncommon for members of my family to travel the necessary two hours to attend Mass there! The abbots have been consistently men of great wisdom and faith; the monastery is always attracting novices; the high school they run not only teaches true Catholicism but also has been the single academically superior boys' high school in Rio for ever. They also run a retreat house and host lectures. Their beautiful Novus Ordo Mass is sung in Latin by the monks who rank just short of Solesmes!
The Benedictine Abbey in Rio, as opposed to many a diocese in Brazil, has been an island of orthodoxy, a consolation for good Catholics, an example of holiness. Something must go right for the true followers of the Rule of Saint Benedict.
Ana Braga-Henebry
Fairfield, N.J.
In defense of tradition
Editor: In the April [1995] issue of HPR, Alice von Hildebrand very forcefully defended the traditions in the Catholic Church, and pointed out how the departure from some of those traditions has contributed mightily to the sorry state of the Church in the United States. It should be so obvious to those who are trashing our traditions that the condition of the Church in our country is in direct proportion to the desacralization that has been taking place.
I know of a Catholic college campus where Mass is said every Sunday for the people of the area. On one occasion the priest made Church tradition the topic of his homily, pointing out how sad it is to see some Catholics who are so passive as to be led around by the nose because of their adherence to the past. To him, those who are faithful to the tried and true traditions of our Faith are unthinking pawns of the past. The authority he used for his position was Vatican Council II, urging all his listeners to be open to the thrust that is now sweeping through the Church. Apparently, the good Father has never read the documents of Vatican II which ratify the traditional elements of our Church. What his real authority was can be found in the term "spirit of Vatican II," which of course means anything he wants it to mean.
A couple of years ago, I wrote a letter to HPR urging a return to the old format of a Syllabus for our Sunday homilies whereby there would be a constant re-evaluation and review of the basics of our Faith. Over the span of a couple of years, our parishioners would be receiving an on-going updating-if I may use some of the modern jargon. I think the need for such re-education grows more urgent with each passing day.
I recently gave a Novena in a parish where there was a bishop in residence. At table conversation one evening, he mentioned that recent statistics showed that the national average of Catholics attending Mass on Sundays was around 20%. That fact alone should be more than enough motivation for our bishops throughout the country to start immediately to instruct our people, from grade school up, in the fundamentals of their Faith.
But unfortunately, so many of our leaders today are more worried about being politically correct than they are about the "cura animarum." They seem to be more concerned about acquiescing to every demand of the feminist agenda than they are about caring for the sheep they are supposed to be shepherding. They give more time and effort to the almost childish attempt of ridding our Mass readings of "sexist language" than they do to promoting the Catholic Catechism among their charges.
All they have to do is look around them to see the work that has to be done. Seminaries by and large are almost scandalous; Catholic education in so many areas is in disarray; priests and religious are abandoning any outward sign of their vocation, reducing themselves to the level of the laity, and even in some cases refusing to vest properly for the Sacrifice of the Mass. What an opportunity there now is for the bishops of our nation to prove themselves to be real leaders!
While we see the public school systems corrupting the minds and hearts of our youth under the guise of teaching safe sex and stopping the spread of AIDS, the Catholic Church can be the leader in restoring real values to the classroom. We can become the recognized champion of real safe sex and the elimination of AIDS by once again emphasizing God's Law. Then maybe we'll see a return to Mass and the sacraments; then maybe we'll see a respect for marriage and family life and a healthy attitude toward the sacred gift of sex.
Eliminating our traditions is not the answer. A wholehearted return to them is!
Rev. Thomas W. Prior, C.M.
Jamaica, N.Y.
Support for spiritual life
Editor: I have been reading HPR for several years now and have come to appreciate the insights it provides. However, I disagree with your editorial on Vita Consecrate (VC; August-September 1996).
The Sisters in our community have each been given a copy of VC for study. I have begun studying it and am finding it an inspiration and support for my spiritual life since it brings out the transcendent aspect of our lives.
My hope is that many bishops, priests, religious and others will read the Exhortation and better understand the real meaning of religious life. I sincerely hope you will have this letter printed so others may be encouraged to study VC.
Sister Dismas Scharinger
Manitowoc, Wis.
Superannuated priests
Editor: A new anomaly has developed in our diocese. I wonder if others have noticed it in their area.
Superannuated priests are at the disposal of a Priests' Council according to procedure rather than reason to the exclusion of critical factors.
Age appears to be a critical consideration in dealing with parish assignments and/or retirement. The latent assumption seems to be that Vatican II is the watershed for decisions. Pre-Conciliar priests are "dated," anachronistic, and redundant as incompatible with the "Church" of the Modernists. Consequently, they are offered an obscure parish or retirement on reaching their sixties. Those who have the "sensus fidei" are deemed eccentric and, therefore, incompatible with the presumed mentality of today's Catholics.
What is emerging is the performance of such antique priests when useful for supply work. Their sermons, in particular, and their devotion to the sacred are the object of laudatory comment wherever they have celebrated. I have been impressed by the comments of solid Catholics from all kinds of parishes where the "homily" is not only good but enriching.
The bottom line is the question: has the Oath against Modernism been abolished before Ordination?
Rev. Peter T. MacCarthy
Leeds, Ala.
Primary and secondary
ends of marriage
Editor: Recently, Msgr. William Smith seems to have changed his position on the primary and secondary ends of marriage. He formerly used to argue, as I saw him do at an HLI convention, (the talk is available on audio tape) that the Second Vatican Council in no way changed this teaching, and left it alone. This he demonstrated by recourse to the footnotes and to the Relators exposition of the pertinent section of Gaudium et Spes.
But now, following the lead of Msgr. Cormac Burke, he says that a "development in doctrine" which of course does not contradict the past, has occurred, and that now, in the light of that development, we should no longer speak of primary and secondary ends of marriage, but rather of "coessential ends," which sort of do equal each other.
The Second Vatican Council is of very much greater weight than either the 1983 Code of Canon Law, or the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The Council did retain the primary/secondary teaching (but not the terminology) by saying:
By their very nature, the institution of matrimony itself and conjugal love are ordained for the procreation and education of children, and find in them their ultimate crown. Indole autem sua naturali, ipsum institutum matrimonii amorque coniugalis ad procreationem et educationem prolis ordinantur iisque veluti suo fastigio coronantur. (GS, 48)
Whatever is ordered to another thing, or for the sake of another thing, is by very definition subordinate to that other thing. That is, it is secondary to the thing to which it is ordered, and that to which it is ordered is primary.
Can a partial explanation of this position of Msgr. Burke et al. be perhaps a misguided "loyalty" to the Pope? They think this is what he wants, even though one will search in vain for any statement of this or any Pope urging us to rid ourselves of the teaching in question.
In fact, Karol Wojtyla, one of the architects of Gaudium et Spes, wrote the following:
One should be careful to take into account this context and the personalistic norm in understanding and presenting the traditional teaching of the Church about the ends of marriage. The Church, in presenting the principles of the order of nature, (the laws of nature) which are corroborated by revelation teaches that the mutuum adiutorium and the remedium concupiscentiae constitute a secondary end of marriage in comparison with procreatio, which is its primary end. The Church decidedly rejected all attempts to shift this order. Obviously, it cannot be accepted that man and woman (excepting the case of acquired or congenital infertility) would join together in marriage primarily in the end of mutual fulfillment or bilateral completion (mutuum adiutorium), for this is not in keeping with the plan of the Creator both in the order of nature, that is, in the light of the reason and in the light of revelation, as well as in the order of grace. It cannot be doubted that the realization of the one in the other order-thus in the light both of reason and of Revelation-takes place along with the taking into consideration of the personalistic norm. It could hardly be otherwise, since man and woman are persons, and especially since-as Christians-they are conscious of the normative power of the commandment of love. This commandment by its normative power must shape the realization of all the ends of marriage-and this must be precisely according to the objective hierarchy which the Church guards. [Archbishop Karl Wojtyla, Roczniki Filozoficzne (Philosophical Yearbooks of the Catholic University of Lublin) Vol. XIII, folio 2 - 1965 original title: "Zagadnienie Katolickiej Etyki Seksualnej" translated by Hugh McDonald, the bold print emphasis is mine.]
This text shows that in the mind of this very active participant in the Council, who now providentially occupies the throne of Peter, and who as Pope has never corrected or contradicted this position, we are to retain the distinction between the primary and secondary ends of marriage and of conjugal love. These ends are part of human nature, and we all know that the natural law is immutable.
So let us please stick to the explicit teaching of the Holy Father, and not attempt to impose what we are so sure is implicit in his teachings. Is it not usually the progressives who try to tell us what the Pope really means?
Rev. Paul J. McDonald
Port Colborne, Ontario, Canada
Insupportable conclusions
Editor: It has been a long time since I have read an article not only extremely insensitive to the human condition, but also so righteously wrong["The End of the Annulment Explosion, July 1996]. To assume that "at the time marital consent was exchanged one or both spouses lacked due discretion or due competence because of a serious mental disorder" (italics are mine) and then construct an argument based on that premise (and that canon 1095 mandates it) is inane. The resulting conclusion that the "U.S. tribunal system maligns the mental health of Catholics . . ." follows from this specious reasoning. The presentation is riddled with similar false constructs. For example: "if in fact most U.S. annulments were not annullable" is the premise for saying that most are not annullable. Somewhere, the "if" gets lost. Another example: "It seems the unholy spirit of Vatican II drastically reinterpreted the Council's words." Vatican II remains to be vindicated, or not, by history, but not yet and certainly not by anyone of limited breadth and experience. The author's concern for the Church's continued purity of marriage doctrine is commendable, but there is simply no possible justification for being holier than the Church and illogically concluding-even with stated Christian charity for fellow tribunal workers-that the perpetrators of this sin against the Church are incompetent judges. Law, discipline and rigor are worthy assets in tribunal work, but without understanding of the human condition they are sterile. The difficulty with this article is not that its concerns are faulty but rather that its perceptions are myopic and hence conclusions insupportable.
Rev. William L. Reitmeyer
Taishan, Taiwan (Republic of China)
McBrien's Catholicism
reminds him of Alfred Loisy
Editor: I read Dr. Fastiggi's article on Richard McBrien's revised edition of Catholicism with a sense of deja vu.
The book, as Dr. Fastiggi points out, is very dangerous because Father McBrien presents it as a true account of Catholic teaching on faith and morals. It is nothing of the kind, but the author expresses himself so ambiguously that many readers will be deceived. He has done his work so skillfully that it was only mildly criticized by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Where, you may ask, is the deja vu? In 1902, Loisy published his L'Evangile et l'Eglise as a defense of the faith against the rationalist version of Christianity of the great liberal Protestant historian, Adolf von Harnack. Harnack, repeating views expounded in 1696 by John Toland in his book Christianity Not Mysterious, held that Christ, the last and greatest of the prophets, but a mere man, had made no transcendental claims, but only proclaimed the coming of an ethical Kingdom of God, in which God would be worshipped as the heavenly Father and men would behave as brothers.
Loisy's book was welcomed as a defense of the Faith, though with certain reservations, by Archbishop Mignot, of Marseilles, and Archbishop Sarto, the Patriarch of Venice, later Pope St. Pius IX. Both were busy men and no doubt had not studied Loisy's text very closely. The man who removed the mask from Loisy's face was Father M. J. Lagrange, O.P., the great biblical scholar. In an article in the Revue Biblique, April 1903, he pointed out that Loisy's account of Christianity was totally destructive of the Christian faith. Like his contemporary Albert Schweitzer, Loisy held that Our Lord's teaching centered in his conviction of the imminent end of the world.
Loisy, who has lost the faith as early as 1886, lost his teaching post at the Institut Catholique in Paris and was eventually excommunicated in 1908.
Some years ago, you published a critique of the first edition of Catholicism with the title, "Freewheeling through the Dogmas." Obviously, a more searching, comprehensive critique of the revised edition is now urgently needed to supplement what Dr. Fastiggi has provided.
G. H. Duggan, S.M.
St. Patrick's College
Silverstream, Upper Hutt, New Zealand