It's Time to Occupy the Churches
This past summer, just before the God of Surprises ordained it be revealed that Grindr users' location data is accessible to the public, Pope Francis issued something unsurprising to traditional Catholics who didn't have their heads in the sand – Traditionis Custodes. I've heard and read a lot of things along the lines of this: "Now is the time to show our bishops how obedient we are. We all need to write letters to them thanking them for allowing us to have the Old Mass these past several years."
I was struck, however, when one commentator compared this to submission to an abusive father. Who would submit to abuse from such a wicked father, especially if your brothers and sisters were also suffering? What if your children were attacked by an abusive father? Would you sit by and try to grovel with such a man?
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We have been beaten by our own father in the name of mercy and marginalized in the name of unity. Abusing his office, he has transgressed our rights to the ancient Mass – what our forefathers bled and died to pass down to us.
As a friend recently remarked to my wife and I, "Traditional liturgy is our birthright." I refuse to beg and grovel for what rightly belongs to my brethren and me by inheritance, just as I don't thank art museum curators for refraining from spray painting graffiti all over the Renaissance sculptures.
And to any traditionalist Catholics who did send boot-licking letters to their shepherds (perhaps with an extra donation "just to show how devoted and appreciative we are") – it didn't work. On December 18, the Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship Archbishop, Arthur Roche, published his own iteration of "The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves." This document further restricts the celebration of sacraments such as ordinations, baptisms and Confirmations in the old rite.
The Psalmist has some words for Trads during these dark times:
And they repaid me evil for good: and hatred for my love. (Psalm 108)
Blessed be the Lord my God, who teacheth my hands to fight, and my fingers to war… Send forth lightning, and thou shalt scatter them: shoot out thy arrows, and thou shalt trouble them. (Psalm 143)
Judge thou, O Lord, them that wrong me: overthrow them that fight against me. Bring out the sword, and shut up the way against them that persecute me. (Psalm 34)
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Instead of trying to appease our enemies, traditional Catholics need to go to war with them. We have every reason in the world. My family discovered our diocesan TLM a dozen years ago. We have since donated sacrificially to it out of love year after year. We contributed to the new high altar and reredos; we took on our parish coffee hour with another family; we started to wake up early every week to bring our sons to serve the Solemn High Mass (they chide us if we move a bit too slowly for them Sunday mornings, fearing that they won't get to the sacristy in time).
My wife and I have always been careful about detracting from the Holy Father within earshot of our children – we want to inculcate a healthy piety for the office of the Roman Pontiff even as we have a healthy understanding of its limits (and the sins of the occupant!).
Two days after Traditionis Custodes was published, my family and I attended a TLM parish at one of our usual summer vacation spots. The priest there made his comments public about the Motu Proprio. On the car ride back to our rental condo, we finally explained to our kids how Pope Francis doesn't like the Latin Mass and was trying to put an end to it. My children, in their innocence, were flabbergasted.
I imagine that my sons had assumed they were doing something good and noble every week as they buttoned up their cassocks, and hearing about the Motu Proprio was like finding out that their dad wasn't proud of them. There are times for righteous anger. If that incident didn't make my blood boil, I'd be something other than a man.
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The enemies of Tradition detest what you and your family hold most dear, and they've made it clear that there will be no detente with us. We should reject out of hand any notion of assisting at "reverent" Novus Ordos with the idea that they'll reward us once we show them we can play nice.
If you have a chip on your shoulder, leave it there. If you don't, get one.
The fact that Pope Francis and the bad guys from Windswept House hate what we do should only embolden us further.
And unless your bishop is one of those ignoring the directives of the Motu Proprio and its evil update, let him know you're a hair trigger-pull away from writing every check you make out in the name of your pastor with a note in the memo reading "Snow Plow Fund" or "Major Repairs." And when you do give, keep in mind that you're a nervous bureaucrat's pen stroke away from having your parish and community destroyed.
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One particular section of Roche's Dubia response reveals much about their motivation: they allow a parish church to substitute for the TLM "when it is not possible to find a church." But, they stipulate, the "celebration should not be included in the parish Mass schedule, since it is attended only by the faithful who are members of the said group."
It clarifies further that the "provisions are to "remind [the faithful] that this is a concession to provide for their good… and not an opportunity to promote the previous rite."
They are afraid of us.
This means, quite obviously, that we should keep promoting the TLM more than ever. Invite family members to see their nephews and grandsons serve. Take photos, and use every social media outlet we have at our disposal. We have the Modernists on their heels, and all of the momentum is on our side. Our enemies know that they can't promote their Mass the way that we can, ours. They know that their days are numbered. Their Novus Ordo funerals might very well double as funerals for the Novus Ordo itself.
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Roche's explanatory note tells us what we already knew implicitly – beauty is like kryptonite to these philistines. We have the high altars, the columns of altar boys in their smart cassocks and surplices, the magnificent vestments made with love. We have Victoria's O Magnum Mysterium and gold patens. When confronted with Pope Francis' trademark scowl, we answer with my eldest son's freckled expression of pride as he finally achieves his promotion to Thurifer. Ours is the Church ancient and enduring. Theirs is in decline. Assail them with beauty and truth. They will be converted or lose their relevance.
But don't ever, ever, think you will please God by showing them how meekly you're willing to whimper as they beat you. The Holy Mass gives glory to Jesus Christ, who was crucified for our sins. We don't imitate Him by being complicit in its destruction. Rather, we must drive the moneychangers out of the temple and overturn their tables (John 2:15).
This is how our forefathers endured the abuse of the 1970s and passed down to us the Latin Mass. They didn't lay down and grovel. They fought like men of God.
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***
On April 12, 1977, Parisian traditionalists got sick of worshipping in the community hall the petty New Church bureaucrats relegated to them for the celebration of their banned Mass. So they did what any decent, God-fearing Catholics should – they processed into the church of St. Nicholas with priests, occupied it, and stayed there. Every living Trad should know by heart the exchange that occurred between the parish clergyman of St. Nicholas du Chardonnet and one of the occupying priests.
'By what right do you come here?' asked one of the parish clergy.
'We come,' replied Mgr. Ducaud-Bourget… 'In Nomine Domini.'[1]
When the police were called by the conciliar priests to expel the invaders, the police showed that they knew more about liturgy than the Congregation for Divine Worship does today. The police did nothing because, as they told the Novus Ordo priests about the Trads: "They're saying Mass and praying, that's what a church is for!"
They also displayed that they were inhabiting a more Catholic, and less officious France, when a group of progressive clergy went to a police precinct to complain about the takeover. Requesting to speak with the officer in charge they were told he was unavailable, as he was attending Latin Mass at St. Nicholas.
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If you're a traditionalist Catholic and think these early Trads went too far, consider for a moment how much of your hard-earned money, time and love you've given to your own parish community. Then consider the fact that it was because of all this righteous "disobedience" that our forefathers fought to pass down the Latin Mass that you now enjoy. They fought and were vindicated by the popes after Paul VI. They fought so hard that the popes were forced to reckon with them and give them the Latin Mass. It is only due to their fight that you have the Latin Mass at all. If you grovel now, our children will be deprived of what is rightfully theirs – the ancient Roman Rite of all the saints and doctors.
Think of our fathers. Think of your children. And fight like a man.
Deus Vult!
Photo by Alison Girone, used with permission.
[1] Michael Davies, The Remnant Newspaper, April 30 1977
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