A bishop then, must be blameless…He should rule well his own household. I Timothy (CCD Revision)
Of late, self-righteous Trad-World has been squirming in a moral funk over rumors of the ordination of a married man. Strange, then, that amid all the scandalized hand wringing, no one has yet piped up to assign the blame for this latest indignity and, indeed, for all the upheaval of the last few years.
There's no doubt about who is responsible. Back in 2009, and even in late 2008, if "One-Hand Dan" had managed the SGG School crisis with finesse, none of this would have come to pass. What's more, the sede-Traddie movement wouldn't be in its death throes, disemboweled by razor-sharp revelations and maddened by withdrawal of financial support.
Sure, there are many players involved whose individual decisions and reactions helped shape the irremediable mess in Traddielandia today. However, irrespective of the side on which you may stand in this dispute, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to trace the deadly sequence of events right back to little, ol' "One-Hand."
All "One-Hand Dan" had to do was to conjure up his sense of self-preservation and invoke his corporate authority. (He has no ecclesiastical authority, mind you.) He could have intervened in the administration of SGG School to right the many wrongs. Furthermore, he could have reined in his blundering and alienating sidekick. There has been widespread conjecture as to why he so uncharacteristically failed to act in his own self-interest. Whatever the reason, be it sinister or silly, "One-Hand's" catastrophic misjudgment affected more than the weekly collection and the bamboozled yokels who keep spinning to nowhere on the cult's hamster wheel.
Think of all the grief he's brought down on the empty heads of his clerical crew. Then consider how he could have spared his collaborators if only he had done what would have been expected -- and required -- of a secular manager in similar circumstances. The Blunderer's sham scholarship and his less-than-amateur Work of Human Hands would never have undergone the rigorous necropsy that appeared on this blog. The rector's embarrassing shortcomings and the moronic pesthouse antics would have escaped the glaring light of continuing exposés. Traddielandia would not have learned about malformed completers who forgot the consecration, couldn't perform a graveside service, had difficulty blessing holy water, invented new mortal sins, and mercilessly harried "seminarians." Chapels wouldn't have dissolved or split. Family members wouldn't have turned against each other. Most significantly, the ultimate "home alone" recourse -- the ordination of a married man -- would have been unthinkable.
Exposing his confederates to hostile attack is "One-Hand's" signature accomplishment. Whatever you may think of B16, you've got to give him credit for bailing out when he realized the harm he caused by failing to manage. But then, unlike sede panjandrums, B16 is smart, well educated, and self-aware. It's a tragedy that the traditional movement lies gasping in the hands of clueless third-raters crippled by so many toxic limitations.
All in all, we should be grateful, for "One Hand's" failure did help us recognize now-ruined Traddielandia for what it truly is: a mirthless gulag guarded by petty, rent-seeking clericalists from which every traditional Catholic with a conscience must escape.
REMEMBER: YOU'VE GOT OPTIONS. EXERCISE 'EM NOW.
Might be my own intellectual shortcomings, but I am left a little confused. What married man was ordained? and by whom? How is this connected to Dolan? Is this via Ramolla? It would seem to me there isn't a trad group then can escape a married ordained man from its lineage. Thuc ordained and consecrated married folks amongst other deviants, Carmona ordained Gaston Lopez; need I go on. This charge is unescapable amongst the majority of trad clergy, especially the majority who all come from the Thuc thru Carmona thru Pivarunas line. I have had amny pleasent conversations with Ramolla but his recent tirade against Slupski makes no sense to me. It is contrived and convenient. He knew Slupski made Scott long before his own elevation just as Pivarunas knew Carmona had ordained Gaston Lopez. Now that these folks have their miters all of a sudden the clerics who have the audacity to ordain the married are seen to have leprocy-how convenient.
ReplyDeleteBp. Dolan merely epitomizes the dynamics of the sedevacantists' sects that ultimately explain these failures.
ReplyDeleteThe clerici vagi atque acephali – that is, the clerics that form part of that anti-modernist resistance which has broken away from the institutional structures of the Church – neither have the authority nor competence to present themselves before the faithful formally as preachers or teachers, much less to demand their assent in such capacities. They can only be “facilitators” who merely witness a process of “clarification of values” – non-authoritative discussion upon principles and the sharing of each individual’s interpretation & practical application of the same – amongst those Catholics whose spiritual welfare they profess to serve. Incapable of claiming Apostolic succession – together with the ordinary jurisdiction & Canonical officio & missio whereto they are indissolubly concomitant – the above clerics cannot pretend to constitute the Ecclesia docens, nor can they arrogate to themselves in any way whatsoever the privileges & prerogatives proper to the Catholic hierarchy alone.
To give the contrary impression to the layfolk – for whom alone the aforementioned clerics may avail themselves only of that jurisdiction which Holy Church supplies in every individual instance necessitated by the salus animarum fidelium – would be a catastrophic aberration: ultimately leading to the creation of an abortive, pseudo-ecclesiastical entity that hearkens back to the sects whereby schismatics & heresiarchs of past ages led the faithful astray from the filial devotion & obedience they are ever to pay to the Apostolic hierarchy of Holy Church alone.
Such an aberration ineluctably leads to two disasters: 1) the distortion or outright negation of the hierarchical and Apostolic nature of Holy Church – the office of the Supreme Pontiff being both the foundation & crown thereof – & the Catholic understanding of ecclesiastical magisterium; &, what is more disturbing, 2) the marginalization & bastardization of the ontological dignity bestowed by the Sacrament of Sacred Orders as a peripheral or accidental datum whose value is to be determined as useful or desirable by a novel “Sacramental pragmatism” that ultimately reduces Holy Orders into a ceremonial ornament that can claim only a subjective sacrality. In this the acephalous & vagrant clerics of the extra-institutional traditionalist movement ironically accomplish the same “ecclesiological positivism” whereby the modernists have endeavored to undermine the sensus Catholicus throughout the past four decades. [...]
[...] With the loss of confidence in the institutional structures of Holy Church, the traditionalists are compelled to rely on fiduciary contractual relationships with individual clerics that ultimately prove to be all too fragile and ephemeral: because, more often than not, they are established upon subjective impressions rather than objective reality, on sentimental impulse than on logical cogitation, on utility gauged by self-serving beneficence than on anything else. The faithful thus place themselves in great peril. For as soon as these covenantal compacts with such clerics are exposed to be as artificial and insubstantial as the clerics’ characters or backgrounds – especially if such relationships are based on distortions or outright deceit – then the faithful lose the stability requisite for the cultivation of the interior life. The spiritual detriment of this phenomenon manifests itself in private & public fora of these Catholics’ lives, as is shown in the labyrinthine dynamics of the extra-institutional “traditionalism” with all its scandals, dissensions, doctrinal & moral depravities, &c. More often than not, such Catholics succumb to the puerile credulity which they had mistaken for faith & find another cleric to continue the delusion of a “non-institutional church."
ReplyDeleteIronically, these sedevacantists have devised an "Œconomia nova," a "novus Ordo", if you will: a self-made microcosm of sacramental and jurisdictional pragmatism, of theological innovation, moral degeneration; a crumbling conglomerate of dead pseudo-structures which carry the resemblance of a broken record of the only real & living structure that alone can claim to be the Church established by Jesus Christ.
A new abominatio desolationis (cf. Dan. cap. ix., 27, S. Matt. cap. xxiv., 15, S. Marc. cap. xiii., 14) has now arisen: not only a Church without a Pope, but a Church that has no need of a Pope to “function.” It is Hus brought back from the dead whom these sedevacantists have apotheosized in the practical realm: "Christ through His true disciples scattered through the world would rule His Church better without such monstrous heads," "Christus sine talibus monstruosis capitibus per suos veraces discipulos sparsos per orbem terrarum melius suam Ecclesiam regularet" (Denz.-Rahner, no. 654); "If the Pope is wicked and especially if he is foreknown, then as Judas, the Apostle, he is of the devil, a thief, and a son of perdition, and he is not the head of the holy militant Church, since he is not a member of it," "Si Papa est malus et praesetim, si est praescitus, tunc ut Iudas apostolus est diaboli, fur, et filius perditionis, et non est caput sanctae militantis Ecclesiae, cum nec sit membrum eius" (ibid., no. 646). .It is a new and vile form of fideicide the fruits of which are too painfully obvious to deny.
And that is the ultimate explanation of the mess the acephalous & vagrant clergy have caused and have yet to bring about in the dynamics of their Alphabet Soup Sects.
Wow! Now that is a response. I have always said that these sede clergy should just shut up. As in quit pontificating and acting as if you have authority, or in fact as if you actually know what you are talking about. In other words act as "simplex" priests. But actually, I was asking you if there is some specific act between this recent rumor of married ordinations (I assume Slupski) and Dolan as you seem to suggest. I also lamented the fact that Ramolla, whom I have discussed this issue with at length in the past, has done a 180 and now appears to have jumped on the bandwagon of condemning those who even entertain the idea of ordaining the married. Pivarunas has a history of doing the same, even distancing himself from Ramolla because he was connected, however remotely, to Slupski. All of this even though they are both directly connected to a lineage wrought with clerics that ordained elevated the married, deviants, etc. Ultimately I was trying to see if you had some knowledge of this rumor and then why you were willing to seemingly attatch it to Dolan. As always thanks for the response, and the great detail.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous 3/9, 2:11 p.m.
DeleteThe learned and enlightening response to your first comment is not ours, although we are in complete agreement with its penetrating critical analysis. (Among its many brilliantly memorable and insightful lines, we loved "continue the delusion of a 'non-institutional church.'")
As to the recent ordination of a married man, we only know what we have read on the Cathinfo thread about Bp. Slupski. We attached it to "One-Hand Dan" because his failure in 2009 set off the chain of events that has brought Traddielandia the "gift" of ruined chapels, dissension, and as the previous commenter so impressively wrote, "the marginalization & bastardization of the ontological dignity bestowed by the Sacrament of Sacred Orders as a peripheral or accidental datum whose value is to be determined as useful or desirable by a novel 'Sacramental pragmatism' that ultimately reduces Holy Orders into a ceremonial ornament that can claim only a subjective sacrality."
Our hope is that the commenter establishes his/her own blog. We will be devoted followers.
A blog of my own? Perish the thought! Does the internet world need yet another blog? Rather not, or so that is my opinion.
DeleteYou have strayed from the original object of your critiques of this blog: the book of Fr. Anthony Cekada on whatever he fancies liturgical study to be.
I understand you believe that all in the tome has been obliterated by your critical analysis and those of others. However, there is still something greater that you seem to be missing.
The tome in question is an ultra-textual artifact that betrays the embarrassing realities of the "Œconomia nova" whereupon I have written above. Forsooth, the "Ecclesia abortiva," which such sectarians as the aforementioned Priest have proposed unto the credulous to be the Church established by Jesus Christ, is itself a "work of human hands."
That is the most sickening irony of that movement, as seen particularly in its pseudo-liturgical praxes together with the theological and canonical aberrations used by these amateur dilettantes to explain away their novelties.
There is a "smack of Hamlet" (as Wordsworth would say) in certain acephalous and vagrant clerics (and in their contumacious adherents) amongst the Alphabet Soup Sects of the extra-institutional traditionalist movement: an œdipal rage and a puerile Stockholm Syndrome that has debased and transmogrified them into frustrated and mutilated personalities that are bereft of humanity.
It makes for fascinating case-studies for the student of empirical psychology and sociology, but it is saddening and harrowing for the student of ascetical and mystical theology. How can the super-nature of grace build upon such fragmented and abject refraction of human nature?
This is yet another explanation for the scandals which have been exposed here and elsewhere.
Dear Anonymous,
ReplyDeletePlease continue, we are listening.
Yes, indeed, Anonymous, pray, continue.
DeleteYou are offering a fruitful phenomenological analysis of the sede cult's ecclesiological fallacy, a venture that exceeds the original intent of our critique: We aimed at the low-hanging fruit -- the shocking absence of scholarship and academic standards. You, on the other hand, are reaching for (or perhaps have found) the essence of the sede problem -- the devaluation of everything genuinely Catholic by an agenda-driven camarilla of me-firsters clumsily passing itself off as a legitimate body formed to preserve the faith.
Please, Sir, some more!
An absence of intellectual formation and neglect of academic discipline are merely indicative of a deeply disordered interior life, which is the ultimate explantion for the antics of these neo-Gallican clerics. In order to efficiently and efficaciously study sacred doctrine, one must have already been well exercised in the moral virtues, not merely a fragmentary and deranged emphasis on the theological virtues without due diligence to the former.
DeleteIt particularly behooves a student of sacred doctrine to be temperate both in intellectual endeavors as well as in his life overall. The Angelic Doctor expounds upon studiousness as the moral virtue which has knowledge as its proper matter (Summa IIa IIæ, q. clxvi., art. 1), and “is a potential part of temperance, as a subordinate virtue annexed to a principle virtue” (“studiositas sit pars potentialis temperantiae, sicut virtus secundaria ei adiuncta ut principali virtuti”), for the moderation of the natural desire that all men have for knowledge pertains to the virtue of studiousness (“moderatio autem hujus appetitus pertinet ad virtutem studiositatis,” ibid., art. 2). St. Thomas goes on to teach that “on the part of the soul, [man] is inclined to desire knowledge of things; and so it behooves him to exercise a praiseworthy restraint of this desire, lest he seek knowledge immoderately” (“ex parte animae, inclinatur homo ad hoc quod cognitionem rerum desideret: et sic oportet ut homo laudabiliter huiusmodi appetitum refrenet, ne immoderate rerum cognitionem intendat,” ibid. ad iii. dub.).
In order to attain to the temperance that is requisite for studiousness, one must needs have recourse to self-knowledge and self-abnegation. He who endeavors to study sacred doctrine ought to lend ear to the admonitions placed upon the lips of our Lord and found in the great treatise De Imitatione Christi: "Son, be not curious, and give not way to useless cares. What is this or that to thee? Follow thou Me," ( Lib. III., cap. xxiv. n. 1), for, "I would gladly speak My word to thee, and reveal My secrets, if thou wouldst diligently observe My coming, and open to Me the door of thy heart. Be circumspect, and watch in prayers, and humble thyself in all things," (ibid., n. 2). For, "I am He that in an instant elevateth the humble mind to comprehend more reasons of the eternal truth than if any one had studied ten years in the schools. I teach without noise of words, without confusion of opinions, without ambition of honor, without strife of arguments," (Lib. III., cap. xliii., n. 3) --- "For a certain person, by loving Me intimately, learned things divine and spoke wonders. He profiteth more by foresaking all things than by studying subtleties," (ibid., n. 4). "Study the mortification of thy vices; for this will more avail thee than the knowledge of many difficult questions," (ibid., n. 1). "In everything attend to thyself, what thou art doing, and what thou art saying: and direct thy whole attention to this, that thou mayest please Me alone, and neither desire nor seek anything out of me," (Lib. III., cap. xxv., n. 3).
[...] Those who pretend to be industrious and diligent to study upon lofty matters and yet neglect their interior lives are in exceeding great peril: "Woe to them that inquire after many curious things of men, and are little curious of the way to serve Me," (Lib. III., cap. xliii,, n. 2). "For he that would fully and with relish understand the words of Christ, must study to conform his whole life to Him," (Lib. I., cap. i., n. 2). "What doth it profit thee to dispute deeply about the Trinity, if thou be wanting in humility, and so be displeasing to the Trinity?" (ibid., n. 3). "Oftentimes call to mind the proverb: The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor is the ear filled with hearing. Study, therefore, to wean thy heart from love of visible things, and to betake thee to the things unseen," (ibid., n. 5). "Truly, a lowly rustic that serveth God is better than a proud philosopher who pondereth the courses of the stars, and neglecteth himself," (Lib. I., cap ii., n. 1). The humble of heart have not this admonition to fear: "The more thou knowest, and the better, so much the heavier will thy judgment therefore be, unless thy life be also more holy," (ibid., n. 3).
DeleteIf such things ought to be carefully pondered upon by laymen and put into practice, how much more by the clergy? And how much more by clergy who cannot claim neither authority nor mission nor competence to even teach or preach upon faith and morals ex officio?
Herein you find yet another explanation for the stupidities of the acephalous and vagrant clerics who feverishly lull the faithful by polluting the internet and other forms of media all the more by their foul logorrhea; refusing to acknowledge the problematic nature of their predicament in light of theology and the Sacred Canons.
This, however, is merely the "tip of the iceberg," as they say. The problem is worst than you may imagine. More on that later, perhaps...
Curious-are these simple subjective observations, or are you also prepared to offer some idea of how you believe we should be practicing our faith or how these clergy should be operating if at all? Are you advocating a home-alone position or perhaps a postion resembling my dear friend Hoot Gibson? Most of us recognize the horrific short comings of these sede Bishops and their organizations, but also conclude their apparent validity. Not being scholars it appears to me that we grasp for sacraments and the resemblance of "Church" especially for the sake of children and grandchildren. Do you advocate another path?
ReplyDeletePlease be aware that I of myself have neither the competence nor authority to guide anyone, especially when it comes to the profession and practice of the Catholic faith. I merely offer the meager fare of my own mediocre mind. It behooves me, however, out of fraternal charity to address your queries.
DeleteWhat is a Catholic to do in these puzzling and vexing days? He is to endeavor industriously and indefatigably to cultivate the interior life particularly by means of constant and instant prayer, together with filial abandonment unto the designs of Divine Providence by the patronage and tutelage of the Blessed Virgin Mary. With this end in mind, he ought to give himself over to the devout study of Sacred Scriptures, the writings of the Saints, &c., and, above all, it behooves him to meditate upon the great commentary upon Holy Writ, De Imitatione Christi: that he may attain to self-knowledge without which humility cannot be genuine. This is precisely the same manner in which the acephalous and vagrant clerics of the extra-institutional resistance against the modernists should comport themselves, particularly those who have acquired the mitre.
I would not advocate a “home-alone” stance, just as I would not advocate the neo-fideism of party-liners who fawn upon their mitred demagogues and adhere to them as if they constituted the Ecclesia docens.
If you are compelled by the exigencies of conscience and earnest convictions, then you ought to avail yourself of the services of the above-mentioned clerics as you as a Catholic have a right to the Sacraments and you may be the one to save them from the infernal fires to which their antics will drive a number of them, or at least vindicate in a way their audacious and impudent decision to take on Sacred Orders without proper formation or institutional legitimacy.
It behooves you to ever keep in mind the ecclesiological doctrines taught by the theologians and manualists of past ages and enshrined in the Code of Canon Law, promulgated by Pope Benedict XV in the Apostolic Constitution Providentissima Mater (27 May 1917; A.A.S., vol. IX, pars II.) which these clerics professedly acknowledge.
The reality is that the aforementioned clerici acephali, the episcopi vagantes may have ostensibly imperiled their salvation in risking the possibility of incurring serious censures and scandal, as well as committing sacrilege and mortal sin, in having attained to the sacred Episcopacy contrary to the norms of Canon Law (cf. Can. 953: “Consecratio episcopalis reservatur Romano Pontifice ita ut nulli Episcopo liceat quemquam consecrare in Episcopum, nisi prius constet de pontificio mandato;” Can. 2370: “Episcopus aliquem consecrans in Episcopum, Episcopi vel, loco Episcoporum, pres-byteri assistentes, et qui consecrationem recipit sine apostolico mandato contra praescriptum Can. 953, ipso iure suspensi sunt, donec Sedes Apostolica eos dispensaverit"), for they have been consecrated as Bishops, and have themselves consecrated other Bishops, without Apostolic mandate.
[...] Although, because of a salutary and necessary application of the principles of epikeia, there is no moral culpability to be imputed to them in this regard, the fact remains that these Bishops and the clerics they have elevated to Sacred Orders have, strictly speaking, no proper ecclesiastical office nor ordinary jurisdiction (habitual or delegated) since they lack the requisite Canonical mission (cf. Can. 147: § 1. Officium ecclesiasticum nequit sine provisione canonica valide obtineri. § 2. Nomine canonicae provisionis venit concessio officii ecclesiastici a competente auctoritate ecclesiastica ad normam sacrorum canonum facta).
ReplyDeleteIt must be emphasized that the sacred Episcopate is subordinated unto the Supreme Pontiff in the order of jurisdiction (cf. 108, § 3: “Ex divina institutione sacra hierarchia ratione ordinis constat Episcopis, pres-byteris et ministris; ratione iurisdictionis, pontificatu supremo et episcopatu subordinato; ex Ecclesiae autem institutione alii quoque gradus accesere;” Can. 109: “Qui in ecclesiasticam hierarchiam cooptantur, non ex populi vel potestatis saecularis consensu aut vocatione adleguntur; sed in gradibus potestatis ordinis constituuntur sacra ordinatione; in supremo pontificatu, ipsomet iure divino, adimpleta conditione legitimae electionis eiusdemque acceptationis; in reliquis gradibus iurisdictionis, canonica missione”). Although the Bishops are truly doctors and teachers for those souls whose pastoral care they have undertaken or have been given, this is only so by reason of the authority of the Pope since the magisterial authority of the Bishops, whether collectively or singly, is dependent upon the jurisdictional and magisterial primacy of the Sovereign Pontiff (cf. Can. 1326: "Episcopi quoque, licet singuli vel etiam in Conciliis particularibus congregati infabillitate docendi non polleant, fidelium tamen suis curis commissorum, sub auctoritate Romani Pontificis, veri doctores seu magistri sunt”).
Moreover, Holy Mother Church, since the Sacred Council of Trent (Session XXIII, De reformatione, caps. 11, 13, 16), has ordained that all clergy are to be incardinated into a diocese or ingress unto Holy Religion (cf. Can. 111, § 1: “Quemlibet clericum oportet esse vel alicui dioecesi vel alicui religioni adscriptum, ita ut clerici vagi nullatenus admittantur”).
One must therefore conclude that all the present day traditionalist clerics are clerici vagi. Supplied jurisdiction given by Holy Church in the various individual instances wherein acts that are necessary for the spiritual welfare of the faithful need to be performed in both the internal and external fora are all that these clerics can claim solely relying on the prudent application of the principles of epikeia. In going any further than this, they risk transgressing the principles of the Sacred Canons and further exacerbate their problematic Canonical predicament all the more. It is precisely because the present day clerics do not have a Canonical mission that they cannot publicly bind individual consciences to their private opinions or practical judgments, save insofar as they conform with the doctrines and customs sanctioned by Holy Mother Church. Even the latter cannot be done as if they have any authority. Nor can they ascribe to themselves the dignities and prerogatives of the Bishops and Priests that ruled over the faithful in ages past by authority of the Supreme Pontiff.
Normally, the Bishops and Priests would be given unquestionable credibility and authority, but, precisely because the Roman Pontiff is presently out of the equation in the practical order (according to the sedevacantists), such can no longer be the case. In doing otherwise, one would perhaps substantiate the anti-sedevacantists' claims that the sedevacantist faithful discard the reverence and veneration due to the Papacy alone, whilst adhering to the vagrant clerics in an irony that is absurdly bereft of the sensus Catholicus.
Just keep these things in mind if you are compelled to avail yourself of these clerics' Mass centres.
DeleteThanks so much for the reply. I do indeed avail myself every Sunday to the sacraments they afford me; I admire their desire to save souls and their zeal in the relentless quest. On the other hand I tire of the constant shenannigans, pontificating and of the otherwise good folks who see them as the "church" if you know of what I speak. God bless,
ReplyDeleteDear Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteGod bless you for sharing with us your insight.
Is there any other place where more of your writings may be found?
Hello Phitopater: Thank you for your kind remarks. Your query must be answered in the negative, for I am not a published author. I may post more comments on other entries of this blog if circumstances oblige or permit. God bless!
Delete