Rome Newsroom, May 9, 2023 / 12:20 pm
Pope Francis said he implemented one of the changes of Traditionis custodes, the 2021 motu proprio restricting the celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass, because the allowances granted by his predecessors were “being used in an ideological way.”
The pope spoke about the Latin Mass in a private conversation with Jesuits on the second day of his April 28–30 trip to Budapest, Hungary. The text of the April 29 meeting with Jesuits was published by the Jesuit journal La Civiltà Cattolica on May 9.
During the question and answer session, Pope Francis said he was concerned about a “reaction against the modern,” or what he calls in Italian “indietrismo,” which translates in English to “backwardness.”
“It is a nostalgic disease,” he said, explaining that this is the reason why he made it necessary for priests ordained after July 16, 2021, to seek authorization from their bishop and the Holy See to offer Mass according to the 1962, pre-Vatican II liturgical books, what is commonly referred to as the Latin Mass.
This restriction was introduced in paragraph 6, article 4 of Traditionis Custodes, issued by Pope Francis in July 2021.
“After all the necessary consultations, I decided this because I saw that the good pastoral measures put in place by John Paul II and Benedict XVI were being used in an ideological way, to go backward. It was necessary to stop this ‘indietrismo,’ which was not in the pastoral vision of my predecessors,” the pope told the group of 32 Jesuits in Hungary.
Through the motu proprio Traditionis Custodes, Pope Francis placed sweeping restrictions on the celebration of Mass using the 1962 Roman Missal, known variously as the extraordinary form of the Roman rite, the Tridentine Mass, and the Traditional Latin Mass.
Francis’ predecessor Pope Benedict XVI had issued a 2007 apostolic letter called Summorum Pontificum, which acknowledged the right of all priests to say Mass using the Roman Missal of 1962.
Francis’ comments on the celebration of the Latin Mass were prompted by a question about reconciling the Church and the modern world, as discussed at the Second Vatican Council.
The pope said: “I wouldn’t know how to answer that theoretically, but I certainly know that the Council is still being applied. It takes a century for a Council to be assimilated, they say.”
“And,” he added, “I know the resistance to its decrees is terrible. There is incredible support for restorationism, what I call ‘indietrismo’ (backwardness), as the Letter to the Hebrews (10:39) says: ‘But we do not belong to those who shrink back.’”
“The flow of history and grace goes from the roots upward like the sap of a tree that bears fruit. But without this flow you remain a mummy,” he said. “Going backwards does not preserve life, ever.”
“You must change, as St. Vincent of Lérins wrote in his Commonitory when he remarked that even the dogma of the Christian religion progresses, consolidating over the years, developing with time, deepening with age,” he said.
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Why is Pope Francis so judgmental, clerical and hateful?
His Holiness Francis says the liturgical restrictions were to promote a Lérinean deepening with age. As to what’s happened to dogma overall, it’s equivalent to a Chateau Canon La Gaffeliere St Emilion deepening into a Gallo Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon.
Fr. Peter, your comment here is the finest blend of wisdom, brevity and humor that I’ve ever read in the CWR comments section. More generally, your comments are always enlightening and enriching appointment reading. Thank you!
I’ll drink to that!
I can only conclude that Pope Francis is woefully out of touch with the Church over which he is Christ’s Vicar. What a shame.
An equal shame is the cowardice of prelates who know better unwilling to tell him to his face.
The Pope’s “Indietrismo” is a pure fiction, in my opinion. The reality is that the imposition of the so-called a N.O. Mass, in the form it was imposed upon us, deracinated the love and spirituality of faithful Catholics for the profoundly rich liturgical life of our holy religion. It was our holy inheritance developed over the history of Holy Roman Church. Why it was done is hardly open to speculation. A high-ranking admitted ‘Masonic’ clergyman with a misguided tendency to adapt our worship to Protestantism gave us the distilled elements of a rude and vicious disruption of Catholic life. An opening of such proportions, which was psychologically aligned with modern cynicism and the observable modern moral dissolution, bears much of the weight of the staggering loss of Faith which only the blind cannot see.
Well said!
We read: “You must change, as St. Vincent of Lérins wrote in his Commonitory when he remarked that even the dogma of the Christian religion progresses, consolidating over the years, developing with time, deepening with age.”
Three points:
FIRST, expanding on Vincent, Cardinal Newman (also the father of Vatican II) explained that “old principles reappear under new forms. It changes with them [“dangers and hopes which appear in new relations”] IN ORDER TO REMAIN THE SAME [!]” (“The Development of Christian Doctrine”).
So, in terms of “ideology,” what does it mean to speak of the Tridentine Mass being used ideologically? While pockets of resistance might be found, might as much or more of an ideological shoe be on the other foot?
SECOND, how, then, to grow the inherited Mass in a manner that does not lose the non-ideological—its expansive, evocative (!) and imaginative (!)—openness in responding to the Mystery of God??? Banners, bland scripts, ambivalent wording? Ideological violations of the Council’s (!) Sacrosanctum Concilium? Ham-fisted treatment of Summorum Pontificum?
THIRD, in line with the complete Vincent of Lerins, Cardinal Newman gives clues about doctrinal development which, yes?, might also apply to the flow of perennial “sap” through a non-mutating and, yes, growing liturgy:
“I venture to set down seven notes of varying cogency, independence, and applicability to discriminate healthy developments of an idea from its state of corruption and decay, as follows: There is no corruption if it retains: (1) One and the same TYPE, (2) The same PRINCIPLES, (3) The same ORGANIZATION, (4) if its beginnings ANTICIPATE its subsequent phases [!] (5) if its later phenomena PROTECT and subserve its earlier [!], (6) If it has a power of assimilation and REVIVAL [!], and (7) is vigorous ACTION from first to last…”
Hello! Weekly Mass attendance in the United States is down from 55% in 1970 to 17% in 2021.https://faithsurvey.co.uk/american-catholic-statistics.html
And, only 29% of United States Catholics even believe in the engaging mystery (!) and gift of the Real Presence (CCC 1374). Instead, the Mass has devolved into something that WE do, should we choose to even show up.
Thank you.
Excellent points. But what are the odds of anyone stating this sense directly to Francis?
Authentic Catholicism most certainly is a threat to the Catholicism of Francisistic ideology.
And one observation about your lament of poor liturgical practice. Since I chauffeur healthcare workers on Sunday morning, I am not able to attend my local TLM frequently. Living in NYC I nonetheless can travel around to seek N.O. Masses with good priests. But it’s getting harder to find Masses that allow any amount of reasonable time to meditate on the Eucharist before the onslaught of end of Mass announcements begin calling attention to the next silly parish party or another frivolous matter.
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! Snap out of it Francis, for your own sake if not for the sake of the flock.
Bergoglio makes no sense here.
What is he talking about? How does someone “go backward” in faith?
Can’t he give us a specific example of what he is complaining about?
And shouldn’t he explain how the rubrics of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as it has been celebrated for many hundreds of years can in any way affect Catholics negatively?
This papacy is extremely tiring, to say the least.
Would Bergoglio make more sense to me if I had a theology degree?
Or two? Or three?
Perhaps a degree in Early Childhood Education, with a major in diapers.
Mr. Briney,
I hope you’ve been well! I think I might add some insight to your conundrum – at least, I’ll be bold and proud enough to try. As I have related in the past, I now attend the TLM and will never again darken the threshold of my local NO parish. There is THAT MUCH of a difference. It’s VAST. It’s STARK. It’s also an expression of the faith that was, at the time that Bergoglio was a young priest, the object of scorn, antipathy and rejection. These young priests were heretical; but, the old priests were passing on. They no longer had much fight in them. They RAZED the mass, destroyed the calendar, eliminated many of the old spiritual exercises, removed the altars, the communion rails, etc., etc., etc. To admit now that they were wrong is, in their estimation, an impossibility. They’ll ride this V2 revolution at the health and well-being of the church all the way into oblivion. What’s at stake is what’s they’ve believed ALL THEIR LIVES. They’re not about to admit it was a mistake. Rather, ALL THE REST OF US that assist at the Latin Mass are hopelessly lost in ancient sentiments, wasting our time pursuing irrelevancy. If I’ve framed this explanation unfairly, I welcome criticism and correction.
BS HONESTLY…WHERE THERE IS THE PETER THERE IS THE CHURCH. YOU GUYS ARE SLOWLY FINDING YOUR WAY OUT OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.. BUT IN YOUR MORALISM THATS WHEER YOU WNAT TO BE…THE POPE IS RIGHT
Within this same series of questions a number of topics came up for which PF provided an answer rooted in “consistency”, how important it was; how essential it is for integrity. Consistency . . . like 1950 years of liturgical consistency? It’s too bad our dear Pope doesn’t see how important it is to understand the measure by which he measures; is the same measure measuring him. 🙄
It’s not so much that the mass has changed that’s the problem; it’s just that the changed mass no longer points to the same Catholic theology. It was no mistake that Cramner and Bucer DEMANDED that the communicant receive STANDING and in the HAND. Why? Because such an act reels against the possibility of the doctrine of the Real Presence and minimizes “sacrifice”. It’s no wonder they smashed the altars and used their top surfaces as stepping stone entrances into their protestant churches. The people were forced to tred on the surface of the altars that had, until recently, been fundamental to the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Perhaps, our dear bishops can go back and revisit the Protestant Reformation as it was rolled-out in England in the mid-16th century. They would find eerie parallels with that time and the 1960’s when similar changes were implemented through Vatican II. It’s time to revisit the last counsel both for its strengths AND weaknesses. It’s the 900 lb. gorilla in the room that no one higher than your local priest (sometimes not even him) dares discuss critically. Meanwhile, the NO parishes continue hemorrhaging and the Latin Mass continues growing. It’s clear where the Holy Spirit is being honored, where God is being adored, loved and cherished.
Apostle Paul said in the book of Corinthians, (referring to an unknown tongue) if someone comes in the church and listens to the message but doesn’t know what the priest is saying, how is that helping him spiritually. I been watching ewtn mass on TV and at certain points in the mass the priest start speaking Latin, which I think, if u don’t know Latin ur lost in the mass worship like most non speaking Latin catholics
Stanley, EVERY religion has a “sacral” language, Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, LATIN . . . there are missals that help those that attend. I have a 1962 Missal that has the English on one hand and the Latin on the other. Most of the time, I’m reading the LATIN. Why? Because the cognates tell a deeper story of the meaning of the prayers being said. Beyond that, the Latin Mass offers the holy Son to the Father; His gift to us is given BACK TO HIM. That’s the whole point, i.e. the SACRIFICE of the Mass. There is so much that makes the Latin Mass so far superior, so deeply interior and so transcendent that, should you go a total of 3 times: once for the Father, once for the Son and once for the Holy Spirit, you’ll never again want to return to the NO Mass. The Latin Mass is truly Heaven on Earth; but, go when the Schola is singing – the High Mass. Go then. If you don’t find it deepening your relationship with Christ, I’ll be shocked.
But their singing makes up for any of that misunderstanding; plus it’s one thing in this world that is still mysterious. I have noticed when they use Latin, you get used to it. My neighbor grew up on Latin and they left the church after Vatican II. Told me recently when he attends a funeral where they use Latin he still remembers and can recite the prayers, but cannot remember them unless he’s at a Latin service
While the Vatican band played Michael Jackson’s man in the mirror?
Francis cites Hebrews 10:39 and uses only the first words of the verse which reads in full, “We are not among those who draw back (shrink back) and perish, but among those who have faith and will possess life.” This verse follows Paul’s exhortation to the new Hebrew Christians to endure in doing the will of God after the initial enlightenment of Baptism, to resist falling away. Several verses earlier in this same chapter, Paul writes, “We should not stay away from our assembly (the liturgical assembly of Eucharist), as is the custom of some, but encourage one another, and this all the more as you see the day drawing near.” Paul is concerned about the falling away that occurs for the newly-initiated who lose vigor, or fear public abuse and afflictions like the confiscation of their property because of their faith. In verses 37 and 38 Paul writes: “For, after just a brief moment, he who is to come shall come; he shall not delay. But my just one shall live by faith, and if he draws back I take no pleasure in him.” Francis cites his fragment from Hebrews with the words “drawing back” or “shrinking back” to make us think Scripture reinforces his impugning of Catholics who “retreat” to the pre-Vatican II liturgy, but the context of the verse in Hebrews chapter 10 has nothing to do with the “backwardness” Francis is trying to accuse faithful Catholic’s of having. Instead, Paul speaks about shrinking from faith. To draw back from faith in Jesus Christ is to perish, he says.
The joyful recompense of double-checking Francis’ Biblical references is deepened knowledge of The Word!
Thank you very much, Beth.
Believe this is not the only time Pope Francis has misused—actually changed the meaning of—scriptural verses to support his political views.
I do not attend the TLM but know faithful good Catholics who do. With all charity and humility. I feel impelled to say that the analysis and arguments the Pope makes here are utter nonsense.
Pope Francis has form when it comes to taking scripture and documents out of context to push his agenda.
Francis is good at cherry picking phrases from various popes and saints to justify his position. Too bad so few clerics don’t point out this devious error.
Warning – virtue-signaling
There is a Latin Mass 55 miles away from me in Lewiston, Maine. To get there I have to rise around 5:30(ish) stumble about for a bit and be on the way at 6 getting there around 7:30 (I drive like a turtle) and I then spend 1 hour in the Church praying, reciting a Rosary, and just sitting there. Mass starts at 8:30.
The music is exquisite, the preaching wonderful, the parish participation very reverent, and after Mass ends usually around 50% or so of the attendees stay behind to pray – quietly. Those who are leaving do so quietly.
But – This Pope says that the allowances granted by his predecessors were being used “in an ideological way.” Could someone – ANYONE – PLEASE explain to me and to many others I am sure – what exactly does that mean? To me it makes no sense at all.
Frequently there are people at the Mass At the Mass who have driven 100 miles or more ONE WAY to get there, while probably bypassing a NO Church 5 miles from home on the way.
My family rises at between 4:30 and 5:00 AM to be at our SSPX chapel 120 miles away. My 14 year old son and 23 year daughter are dressed in their best and ready to go by 5:30 AM. When we attended our local NO parish 10 minutes from home, my kids would dally to the point of being late to arrive. Our local NO parish is dying of its own “weight, gas and age”. The only people now still attending are what were (still are?) Woodstock hippies. Many of the car bumpers in the lot have Obama Biden bumper stickers. The NO is a non issue in my book. It’s demise is inevitable and welcome as the Vetus Ordo ascends. Deo Gratius!
Why don’t you and your family and SSPX community storm your local church and take it back? It’s called “evangelizing.” Nothing better than seeing a conservative group of folks battle it out with the hippy-dippy crowd. Most of the younger priests will support you. They’re grateful for you, and other TLM-ers, because you all left, and in essence created a new church. My local NO parish, and many others, are not dying. Remaining in the SSPX does nothing to effect change.
The renewal of the Church will come from the East, when the Orthodox return. They are not suffering from the fanatical nostalgia and Protestant uppity behavior of the TLM groups.
And as an aside, your kids dallying to get to Mass is on you, not the former of Mass. Ridiculous.
Ideological was the label the Pontiff Francis gave to Archbishop Chaput, and given that Chaput publicly voiced his critique at/about the “Family Synod” and Amoris Latetiae, “ideological” clearly means respecting the 6th Commandment, and of course failing to be “Gay-Positive.”
Chris – I assume you’re responding to my question, for which I thank you but – the statement still makes no sense at all.
Archbishop Chaput, on the other hand, has been and remains one of the people I look up to in these times – a voice of hope and reason.
This interview makes me wonder about the secret China-Vatican agreement. Is this agreement the Pope’s way of being sure that the underground Church in China doesn’t go backwards and will get with the modern program of the CCP? China is the senior partner in this agreement. The modern Church often acts like King Solomon did under the influence of his foreign wives.
Mass is a humble sacrifice in memory of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. We need to pray for the conversion of mass warriors.
Yes, but for possible clarification, also infinitely more than a memory. Rather, the “continuation and extension” (words of St. John Paul II in his Prayer before Mass) of the singular self-sacrifice of the God-Man Christ on Calvary:
“…In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist :the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity [!], of our Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore, THE WHOLE CHRIST IS TRULY, REALLY, AND SUBSTANTIALLY [italics] contained [….] wholly and entirely present” (CCC 1374).
I share your view because I am wondering about the following issues:
1). What does the pope really mean by the idioligucal use of Lstin?
In this regards I ask:
2). The ideology of which government, political party or organisation?
3). I know that the Second Vetican Council provided for, or approved, the use of local languages provided they are not based on or connected with superstition.
4). Should the Holy Church sent to convert the world be converted by the world as a sign of medernisstion? In order words should the Holy Church be in the world and be of the world? Or, by another thought, should the Holy Church please the world and not God?
4). Has any person or nation ever pleased some people or the world without destroying the essence, meaning or value of its uniqueness, traditions, or customs, and its necessity and importance?
5). These questions are considered necessary for dealing with the issues of ideology and “shrinking back”.
6). The Holy Church has been contending with materialism, individualism, secularism, sexual profligacy and criminality (abortion), feminism and globalisation. Should she be plunged into another problem, idioligy?
Upholding faith is never Pelagian or “rigid” or “incurvatus” or “indietrist” or backward-looking or nostalgia. Etc., etc. Neither is it Jansenist. With all these changing labels you are proving it is impossible for you to specify what the specific reality is, that you are so trying to impact -or, affect, or, uncover, or what.
‘ The standard-bearer is not a combatant, yet nonetheless he is exposed to great danger; and inwardly he must suffer more than anyone, for he cannot defend himself as he is carrying the standard, which he must not allow to leave his hands even if he is cut to pieces. Just so contemplatives have to bear aloft the standard of humility and must suffer all the blows which are aimed at them, without themselves striking any. ….. Do you think those to whom the King gives these duties are being given a light task? ….. Their duty is to suffer as Christ did, to raise the Cross on high ….. and not let themselves be found backward in suffering ….. Great harm, I think, is done to those not so far advanced if those whom they consider as captains and friends of God let them see they are acting in a way un-befitting to their office. ‘
– Teresa of Avila,, The Way of Perfection, Chap. 18 (Doubleday First Image Books NY NY 1964 / Nihil Georgius Can. Smith, Imprima. E. Morrogh Bernard 1946)
“Nostalgic disease” is refusing to understand the 1970’s Iconoclast Movement is over.
Oh that’s why the FBI wanted to investigate the churches to see if Latin mass, because of shrinking back to the good old days of the 1950’s. They think this is racist! CRT training at its finest.
Or a gathering of people who believe in the eternal God, not the god of state.
I do have to note the following thought experiment.
Consider a hypothetical Christian AG presiding over the infiltration of Mosques or Synogogues.
I don’t agree with your comment, but I attempted to post something similar comparing … Francis to the FBI. I doubt that it will be published.
Essentially … Francis and the FBI are concerned that opposition is likely to form among those who attend TLM. For the FBI it is/was about the “unicorns” that they call “extremists.”
Yes, Your Holiness, because to be modern is to have a singular attachment to a ritual relic from the late 1960s. Everyone is simply waiting for this miserable pontificate to end.
Amen.
But everyone really knows it is the “Novus Ordo” that is the ideological weapon.
Next the pope will say the bible is not living up to the times??? Not looking forward…. it could happen with this man.
Second attempt at send. First attempt timed-out.
Quo Primum Pope Pius V 1570
Promulgating the Tridentine Liturgy
https://www.papalencyclicals.net/pius05/p5quopri.htm
Pope Benedict’s “Summorum Pontifcum” eliminated an illegal construct known as the “indult” wherein a priest had to ask his bishop for permission to celebrate the TLM. Pope Francis’ ironically named “Traditiones Custodes” is illegitimate on its face because Pius V’s “Quo Primum” although wordy, is very clear that no one may restrict the celebration of the Tridentine Liturgy. No one.
Pope Francis’ requirement that a priest receive permission from both his bishop and Rome ratchets things up and is pure mean-spirited micromanagement in the service of suppression of the TLM.
Without apology, before God and the angels, I state that an enemy of the Latin Mass is an agent of Satan.
Joseph, Quo Primum was written before Vatican II and by a truly Catholic Pope. There is no way the current church will advertise to the faithful about what it really says. When PF did mention Quo Primum he stated Pius V created the old mass.
Who is the ideologue?
As Pope Benedict XVI said long before he became the Holy Father, the Holy Spirit always inspires, men do not always listen. The papacy is not a magical enterprise. It serves a prophetic role when it faithfully adheres with awe and devotion to Divine Revelation, to the perennial understanding of Divine Revelation by the Church, not appealing to their own confections: “This is what the LORD Almighty says: ‘Do not listen to what the prophets are prophesying to you; they fill you with false hopes. They speak visions from their own minds, not from the mouth of the LORD’” (Jeremiah 23:16).
Thank God for Pope Francis that keeps it all relevant and true to our Catholic faith.
If the Usus Antiquior, practiced for centuries, retains every formal element that makes it Mass, remaining united with the One Mass that mystically collects and binds all, how can this be in error, if clear-hearted consciences are wed to that spirit of unity?
Christ, the Gospels, Tradition away with all that «indietrismo».
Vat II and year One of New Revolutionary Church blah, blah, same old…
Project much, Papa Francesco?
That was going to be my comment, but then I opted to be little more explicit.
… Francis is concerned about the TLM like the FBI is/was concerned about it. The FBI said that they were concerned about so-called “extremism,” but what they are actually concerned about is likely the coalescing of a movement that would upset TPTB who likely control the FBI and The Justice Department.
The TLM is a possible “political rallying point” for those who might oppose … Francis. That said, it is doubtful that there is more than a few licit (i.e. authorized) celebrations of the TLM in the world. I don’t know how many are currently public, but there was one in “a Far East country.” I met a true priest from this country in 2016.
When one goes on the Paris de Chartes at Pentecost, one is drawn into an experience that is not of this world! I’m still haunted by that, and to paraphrase Van Morrison once said: Wouldn’t it be great if it was like this all the time? Yes indeedy!