Search This Blog

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Is the Novus Ordo Deficient?

A while back, I was participating at a website wherein I discovered after 7 years of participation, I was no longer welcome.  That was a sad day.  The whole thing started because I made the move from being a "mainstream" Catholic to being a "traditional" Catholic.  One of the first things that I posted was that I think the Novus Ordo is deficient, as a tool for worship.  I still agree with that assessment.  I will stand behind that assessment, due to several factors....

1.  It has been stripped of vital prayers
2.  It has been stripped of it's musical heritage
3.  It has been stripped of it's solemnity
4.  It is completely fabricated by men in the late 1960s.
5.  It constitutes a clean break with Tradition.
6.  The structure of the Mass fundamentally changed
7.  The nature of the Mass fundamentally changed

There are more reasons, but these are some of the key reasons I believe the Novus Ordo is deficient with regard to the TLM.  This view, eventually sent me through a series of suspensions and eventually caused me to ask for formal resignation (which still hasn't been granted, as I see my profile still exists).

As it turns out, my friend Fr. Z has posted a statement which seems to echo my view.  I wonder, would Fr. Z be banned from this website too?  Here is what was said over at WDTPRS:
A reader sent this.
Would that this Pope were heeded — and would that he heeded his own advice!
Paul VI on Liturgical Reform
The proper implementation of the Constitution on the Liturgy [Sacrosanctum Concilium] requires of you that the “new” and the “old” be brought together in a bond that is both suitable and beautiful. What must be avoided at all costs in this matter is that eagerness for the “new” exceed due measure, resulting in insufficient regard for, or entirely disregarding, the patrimony of the liturgy handed on. Such a defective course of action should not be called renewal of the Sacred Liturgy, but an overturning of it. The liturgy, in fact, displays a similarity to a hardy tree, the beauty of which shows a continual renewal of leaves, but whose fruitfulness of life bears witness to the long existence of the trunk, which acts through its deep and stable roots. In liturgical matters, therefore, no real opposition should occur between the present age and previous ages; but all should be done so that, whatever be the innovation, it be made to cohere and to concord with the sound tradition that precedes it, and so that from existing forms new forms grow, as through spontaneously blossoming from it.
Sent without citation.

Interesting, isn't it?  Fr. Z seems to be quoting something of which I am the same mind, yet a site where I was a major contributor for 7 years vilified me for holding the exact same view...my situation with the former site is a prime example of why the "mainstream" Church is suffering the trials it is right now with her faithful.  Because, the faithful are being fed from an insufficent source.

If the Church is to grow, then the Church should take heed to what Papa Ratzinger is trying to accomplish with the restoration of the TLM to equal footing.  The TLM is the authentic expression of the mind of the Church, it's continuity lies within the 2000 year history of the Church.  The Novus Ordo most simply put; is the invention of a committee headed by an embattled priest in the 1960s.  It has been said that nothing good came from the 1960s, that certainly is the case with the Novus Ordo.  While it is valid, it certainly is not contiguous with the 2000 year history of the Church.

It IS the "great experiment which failed."  An entire generation of Catholics hung their liturgical hats on a priest who ended up failing as a diplomat with Muslims in a country that didn't want him.  And what he left us, is a deficient form of worship which has produced NOTHING of what it promised.  NOT ONE THING!

The Novus Ordo didn't draw the faithful to Mass.
The Novus Ordo didn't expand the theological framework of the liturgy
The Novus Ordo didn't edify and grow vocations to the priesthood.
The use of the vernacular didn't make the Mass more intelligible
The Novus Ordo did exactly one thing...prove that man cannot re-imagine the Church in his own image.

Save the Liturgy, Save the World.

No comments:

Post a Comment