So what is the deal with traditionalists,
the new liturgy, and the "Paschal mystery?" Fr. Zed has recently
posted several things that indicate Cardinal Muller and Bishop Bernard Fellay
are still talking with some regularity and that hopes for
"reconciliation"—whatever that would mean—are not necessarily dashed
with Francis' papacy. One commenting reader said on several of these posts that
the FSSPX must accept something called "the Paschal mystery" in order
to be reconciled. What is the Paschal mystery?
To the best of my knowledge, Lefebvre's
Fraternity does observe the Resurrection on the Sunday after Holy Week. No
internet search yields clear results as to what the Paschal mystery is, but it
does reveal a few articles from the Fraternity's website and another elsewhere
by Fr Peter Scott about the problems of "Paschal mystery" theology in
the Pauline Mass. The objection seems to be that the "Paschal
mystery" is too focused on God's love and kindness, too little how
offended He is by sin and demanding of propitiatory sacrifice to placate Him.
The last part of this is a very sore spot for traditionalists whose view of
tradition narrowly corresponds 19th and early 20th century Catholicism. Session
22 of Trent was crystal clear that the Mass is a propitiatory sacrifice for the
living and the dead. People do seem to forget why. If the Mass is an anamnesis of Calvary, the same sacrifice of
the Cross is the sacrifice of the Mass. It was a sacrifice for our sins which
is made present again on numerous altars throughout the world daily. Calvary
was an act of love. We are not Puritans who are aroused by the likes of
Jonathan Edwards' Sinners in
the Hand of an Angry God, a God so offended by sin that He dangles over the
fires of hell as a spider dangles from his thread. The reduction of God's
hatred of sin to a debt repayment alone, ignoring the proactive love of God the
Father, gives one the impression that God is infinitely offended, that we have
an enormous debt to pay, and that Jesus was the only one who could pay it. Why
is the need to make reparation to the Father and to do penance in contradiction
to God's love? Why are the two exclusive to each other? While certain prayers
of the Mass do emphasize propitiation (the Roman offertory, the Placeat tibi at the end of
Mass), a greater number of the orations emphasize love, teaching, and
forgiveness. Liturgically, the Church's mind is that the two are inseparable,
neither contradictory nor separate things.
The Eastern rites are far more Paschal
than the Latin rites. In the Byzantine tradition, the troparion and kantikon on
most Sundays is about the Resurrection. During the equivalent of the Preface,
the celebrant says "You brought us from nothingness into being, and when
we had fallen raised us up again, and left nothing undone until You brought us
to heaven and granted us Your future kingdom." The nearest thing to propitiation
in the Greek tradition might be "We offer You Your own from what is Your
own, from all and for the sake of all." If we are to apply St. Vincent of
Lerins' test that for something to be a teaching of the Church it must be
believed always, everywhere, and by everyone, the idea of the Eucharist as an
exclusively, or even primarily, act of propitiatory satisfaction fails. Canons
I and III of Trent, session 22, condemn the idea that the Mass is a human act
of praise that does not have sacrificial value to God, which is absolutely
heresy. To limit our understanding to a condemnation though is narrow if not
dangerous.
Again, not knowing much about the
"New Theology" in vogue during the Pius XII and Paul VI years, I
cannot comment of the "Paschal mystery," but as a Catholic I can say
something about the exclusion of love from the focus of the liturgy. Perhaps
this "Paschal mystery" idea was a Trojan horse to water down the
sacrificial aspects of the Roman Mass and the inconvenient difficulties of
judgment, sin, and hell. If so, commentators should write with more
perspective.
Have you seen the SSPX booklet, "The Problem of the Liturgical Reform?" It's online I think. I imagine that's their most detailed critique, not simply of the new liturgy, but the theology of the "Paschal Mystery" which they believe to be behind the reform. The booklet is mostly typical SSPX argument, but in more depth and detail.
ReplyDeleteAnd here was the response to that book by Card Ratzinger;
DeleteI mention this strange opposition between the Passover and sacrifice, because it represents the architectonic principle of a book recently published by the Society of St. Pius X, claiming that a dogmatic rupture exists between the new liturgy of Paul VI and the preceding catholic liturgical tradition. This rupture is seen precisely in the fact that everything is interpreted henceforth on the basis of the "paschal mystery," instead of the redeeming sacrifice of expiation of Christ; the category of the paschal mystery is said to be the heart of the liturgical reform, and it is precisely that which appears to be the proof of the rupture with the classical doctrine of the Church. It is clear that there are authors who lay themselves open to such a misunderstanding; but that it is a misunderstanding is completely evident for those who look more closely. In reality, the term "paschal mystery" clearly refers to the realities which took place in the days following Holy Thursday up until the morning of Easter Sunday: the Last Supper as the anticipation of the Cross, the drama of Golgotha and the Lord’s Resurrection. In the expression "paschal mystery" these happenings are seen synthetically as a single, united event, as "the work of Christ," as we heard the Council say at the beginning, which took place historically and at the same time transcends that precise point in time. As this event is, inwardly, an act of worship rendered to God, it could become divine worship, and in that way be present to all times. The paschal theology of the New Testament, upon which we have cast a quick glance, gives us to understand precisely this: the seemingly profane episode of the Crucifixion of Christ is a sacrifice of expiation, a saving act of the reconciling love of God made man. The theology of the Passover is a theology of the redemption, a liturgy of expiatory sacrifice. The Shepherd has become a Lamb. The vision of the lamb, which appears in the story of Isaac, the lamb which gets entangled in the undergrowth and ransoms the son, has become a reality; the Lord became a Lamb; He allows Himself to be bound and sacrificed, to deliver us. ...
I wrote my college senior thesis on this very topic about 10 years ago.
ReplyDeleteAn alternative question - would the Roman Rite as written and codified by Pius V be accused of being Puritan, rigid, loveless, etc? I think Paschal mystery is just one of those ambiguous platitude phrases thrown around to justify about anything done to the Liturgy, theology, etc. during the mid-century. It's a buzz word, one that is convenient for the SSPX et al. to use to sum up (rightful) opposition to the nouvelle theologie (the real and better defined culprit) and the systemic removal of texts in the Novus Ordo referring to sin, judgment, hell, and propitiatory sacrifice. The Novus Ordo cannot defend itself from this assessment, but can the "unreformed" Roman rite really be accused of the opposite problem?
ReplyDeleteAn alternative question - would the Roman Rite as written and codified by Pius V be accused of being Puritan, rigid, loveless, etc?
DeleteOne can, alas, find no lack of clerics and lay liturgists in the Church today who think so - and I have heard more than one say so quite explicitly in my presence. Indeed, last time around one was more than willing to extend the condemnation back much further, e.g., the dangerous obsolescence of "7th century theologies."
Modernists use the term as a replacement for redemption, and that is bad. Sure, all things paschal are a mystery, but theology and Scripture already did their terminology.
ReplyDeletealso, Jesus is the only one who could repay the debt, although, as is the opinion of st. Thomas, it was not by absolute necessity of means that He did it on the Cross, since being Godman, every of His acts has infinite value in front of God the Father, and has consequences for mankind. also it is opinion of st. Thomas that God wouldn't act injustly if He just forgave the sin like that.
This.
"Paschal Mystery Theology" entered into vogue in the Pius XII years, and I believe the phrase is in one of his encyclicals. It is a theology which intentionally downplays (especially personal) sin and the need for redemption in order to favor a feel-good lovey-dovey universalist "redemption."
ReplyDelete"Paschal Mystery"... Another shining example of Orientalism (taking something from an Eastern Theological view out of its context and missing the point entirely... a bastardization).
ReplyDeleteOnly traditions which are not your own can be reverenced in today's Church. Selectively, of course.
DeleteFar easier to get an Eastern icon into your chapel than, say, a classical statue. And let's not get started on all those anaphoras, so delightfully butchered and refashioned in the new EP's.
Define "Traditional Statue". If it's a 19th century plaster thingy, a young "St. Joseph", or white pretty-face Jesus, then I'll gladly take the Eastern icon.
DeleteIf the church wants to put up a Romanesque Mosaic or a Scandinavian-style wood-carved statue, then we can talk.
Lord of Bollocks,
DeleteSorry, that was a bit of snark. "Non-traditional statue" here would be modernist twaddle that looks like a project from metal shop class gone badly wrong.
I get your point; I'm not a big fan of the kitschy end of American neo-Gothic, either. But I also think that wasn't the only (or even primary) animus driving so many modern Roman Rite folks into selective Orientalisms.
Fr. Scott picks up the term "Paschal mystery" (read the entire article at the link) from John Paul II's encyclical on the Eucharist, Ecclesia de Eucharistia and seems to use it as a convenient locus for what he perceives as the loss of the necessary sense of propitiatory sacrifice in the Mass. He's on to something, but (as is sometimes the case with many in the Society) overstates matters. John Paul employs the word "sacrifice" in EDE no less than 64 times; indeed, at one point (sec. 9), he even says, effusively: "How can we not admire the doctrinal expositions of the Decrees on the Most Holy Eucharist and on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass promulgated by the Council of Trent?"
ReplyDeleteAll that said, there is the sense in EDE, as with so many conciliar and post-conciliar texts, that it generally employs a noticeable shift away from theology that keeps the Four Last Things as a necessary referent in favor of love, mercy, etc; but even when it lurches in the direction of traditional theological propositions, fails to say them as clearly as was usual in the "bad old days." And, in all truth, the great danger of our time is not (to put it mildly) an excess of fear and excessive scrupulosity, which is why I am less bothered by SSPX excesses on this point given the context of therapeutic banalities that generally inform Catholic life in most parts of the West today. I can't help but feel like JPII is not really Fr. Scott's target here.
One point of curiosity, Rad Trad: This sentence leaves my a little befuddled: The last part of this is a very sore spot for traditionalists whose view of tradition narrowly corresponds [to] 19th and early 20th century Catholicism.
I am not sure I understand what exactly it is about 19th and early 20th century Catholicism that's distinct (in any sense relative to this discussion) from, say, 18th or 17th or 16th century Catholicism. Indeed, by most reasonable measures the 19th century Church was a healthier place than it was in the latter decades of the Enlightenment.
By 19th and 0th century Catholicism I meant the catechetical books used for instruction and seminary teaching of that period which focused primarily and preferentially on the propitiatory element of the Eucharist, almost quantitative (the Father is very offended and we owe so much so only Christ can repay it, and that repayment of debt is necessary for salvation).
DeleteI would agree that, on the whole, the Church of Pius IX was in better shape than that of Pius VI.
Rad Trad,
DeleteInteresting. I haven't made a study of the books and manuals in question, or at least not enough to make a comparison between the 18th and 19th centuries on this point. Now I feel some temptation to do so.
Catholic education, seminary or otherwise, had taken a heck of a walloping when everyone emerged from the rubble after Waterloo. Not just Napoleon and the Revolution, but also Clement XIII's suppression of the Jesuits, all did tremendous damage. Newman's observations, on his trip to Rome, on the state of the Roman academies, and the general ignorance of Thomas and much else besides are sobering. If what you say is true, I wonder if any of that played a role in such a shift.
Fr. Zuulendorf's blog does attract some interesting commentators. 107 responses on his most recent post about the FSSPX!
ReplyDeleteI think that though the "Paschal mystery" idea was a Trojan horse to water down the sacrificial aspects of the Roman Mass, as you said, maybe this will eventually lead to a balance between the West's emphasis on sacrifice and the East's emphasis on Resurrection. Like you said, we need both.
ReplyDelete