...I received an unsolicited email from a "Catholic traditionalist" newsletter, excoriating the Holy Father for visiting a synagogue. Its tone was horrid, its style pompous and self-important, its underlying message worrying.
Now the Holy Father has made a new initiative: recognising that there are numbers of good people who go to Lefebvrist churches because they seek the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, he wants to bring them into the Church, and has taken the risky path of announcing the lifting of the excommunication on the four Lefebvrist bishops.
This is the same Pope who went to the Synagogue in Cologne - and again in New York - and was well received, and who has specifically amended an old prayer in order to make it less offensive to Jewish people. It would be a hopeful sign if some Lefebvrist voices were raised in affirmation of his warmth and friendliness towards the Jewish people, if regrets were expressed for any offensive anti-Jewish sentiments expressed under a "traditionalist" banner, and if a clear indication of loyalty to the Pope were to be given at least in this one matter even before other more contentious issues were to be discussed.
Incidentally, I know of many good people who regard themselves as traditionalists and who are not remotely anti-semitic and probably as baffled as I am by the possibility that any Catholic could be. The plain fact is that we are not Catholics because we believe in some sort of anonymous thing called "Tradition" but because we believe in God and his laws, taught through his Church. Chief among these is the command (not request!) that we love our neighbours. Jewish people are our neighbours. We will be judged on whether or not we obeyed God's commandments.
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8 comments:
Hear hear!!!! Very well put, Auntie!!
I for one would like to see more supporters of the SSPX openly distancing themselves from anti-Semitic attitudes. Even after the excommunications, and the 2008 terms (which omit any insistence on recognising Vat 2), there are traditionalists who seem more intent on circling the wagons than condemning unsavoury remarks by some in their midst.
I,m a Catholic and in all my years on this earth. I have never know any Catholic who is against people of any other religious belief. We as Catholic,s, I feel are the least extreme and embrace all humans, What ever their faith. We are not fanatics, we don,t push our faith on to others. We love our God. Why? Because it is right for us.
I think Fr. Schmidberger's condemnation of anti-Semitism was actually very eloquent and hard-hitting. Yes, I know you can say that has more to do with the Society's internal politics, but coming from such an important figure in Catholic "traditionalism" I think it was very significant.
The Society's real problem is one of trust. The last Pope didn't trust them, even though they were completely loyal to the Church and the Faith and the Sacraments. Now the present Holy Father has shown that he does trust them. I hope the Society's bishops now trust him (and each other!) and that "their" priests trust them.
In my experience a lot of people turn to the Society because they've been very badly treated by priests and bishops in the mainstream Church. I also think it has a lot more to do with faith and belief than to do with what rite the priest says Mass in. A lot of Lefebvrites, especially in foreign countries, would not mind the Mass in the Novus Ordo if it was said in a faithful and reverent manner. Their problem is they've just met a lot of priests who aren't very good, and they've read a lot of scandalous stories about things going on in the modern Church.
How about loving your neighbours even if they're Muslim? There's a very disturbing level of Islamophobia on some Catholic blogs in the UK.
"I know of many good people who regard themselves as traditionalists and who are not remotely anti-semitic "
Only many?
But less than most?
But certainly not all?
Liberals are fundamentally right about race, fundamenatally wrong about sex and religion, and completely wrong when it comes to homosexuals and animals. However they see all these areas as "equality ethics".
Accusations of racism, or anti-Semitism in particular, have a bad name, because they are used to push through a multi-cultural (code for deChristianising) agenda. Their rightness about race is a Trojian horse for their wrongness about religious and sexual ethics.
However that doesn't mean there is no such thing as anti-Semitism. I have only heard Bishop Williamsons' views on Jews at second hand, however if he genuinely beleives that only 200,000 Jews were killed during the Second World War, and the number was exaggerated for political expediency, then he is a crank and frankly not a very suitable choice as Catholic bishop.
What is happening to our world.The new president of the USA seems to be pro abortion.Reglious in fighting seems rife(Gaza). People are loseing their jobs.Can we not all join together, to make life better.I really feel the world we live in today is not the on our God envisaged.
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