Authenticity

2 May 2006

The Most Reverend William Skylstad
Bishop of Spokane
President, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
Prot. n. 499/06/L

Your Excellency,

With reference to the conversation between yourself, the Vice President and General Secretary of the Conference of Bishops of which you are President, together with me and other Superiors and Officials when you kindly visited our Congregation on 27 April 2006, I wish to recall the following:

The Instruction Liturgiam authenticam is the latest document of the Holy See which guides translations from the original-language liturgical texts into the various modern languages in the Latin Church. Both this Congregation and the Bishops’ Conferences are bound to follow its directives. This Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments is therefore not competent to grant the recognitio for translations that do not conform to the directives of Liturgiam authenticam. If, however, there are difficulties regarding the translation of a particular part of a text, then this Congregation is always open to dialogue in view of some mutually agreeable solution, still keeping in mind, however, that Liturgiam authenticam remains the guiding norm.

The attention of your Bishops’ Conference was also recalled to the fact that Liturgiam authenticam was issued at the directive of the Holy Father at the time, Pope John Paul II, to guide new translations as well as the revision of all translations done in the last forty years, to bring them into greater fidelity to the original-language official liturgical texts. For this reason it is not acceptable to maintain that people have become accustomed to a certain translation for the past thirty or forty years, and therefore that it is pastorally advisable to make no changes. Where there are good and strong reasons for a change, as has been determined by this Dicastery in regard to the entire translation of the Missale Romanum as well as other important texts, then the revised text should make the needed changes. The attitudes of Bishops and Priests will certainly influence the acceptance of the texts by the lay faithful as well.

Requesting Your Excellency to share these reflections with the Bishops of your Conference I assure you of the continued collaboration of this Congregation and express my religious esteem,

Devotedly yours in Christ,

+Francis Card. Arinze

Prefect, Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments

Sepe seppellito

Today the Holy Father has cleared out another murky stable, that of Propaganda Fide. In a move every bit as dramatic as the banishment of Archbishop (only) Fitzgerald to Cairo, the sinister Sepe has been sent down (not only geographically) to Naples. Sepe has been buried.
Those who wish to know the background for this move will find it by clicking the title of this post.

Diseased Legion

It seems certain that accusations against the founder of the Legion of Christ have been substantiated.

Truly traditional Catholics have never really liked the Legion. We smelled a rat. Much of the outward show of a traditional religious order was present, but there was something not quite right about it all. There was the wooden nature of their characters, the obvious brainwashing, the annoying, deliberately naif attitude to the internal problems of the Church today. Modernist lacunas gaped in the midst of orthodox teaching; stiff and formal liturgies embraced novelties, albeit it stiffly and formally.

In my limited contact with them, I noticed a distinct lack of fervor towards Pope Benedict, and on ongoing, enthusiastic veneration for his predecessor.

Thank God for the shrewdness of our Pope.

Whither the Legion now? One would hope that an enlightened superior would lead them along a more solidly traditional path. But how is an enlightened leader to emerge from such brainwashed ranks? Still, it is an intention worth praying for. We cannot ignore that much good has been done by the Legion, and it would be a pity to see that wasted. Tantus labor non sit cassus.

Taking the biscuit

I love the way the Fraternity of St Peter can do the most over the top things and yet not seem camp about it!