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13)  ANSWERING SOME OBJECTIONS

163.  This Part will consist of the raising of some possible objections to or arguments against some of the points set forth in this monograph, followed by the author's attempt to answer the said objections or arguments.

First Objection

164.  Objection 1:  Taken as a whole, your monograph seems to lack balance, for you don't show both sides of the issue.  Your arguments are based principally, either directly or indirectly, on the theology of St. Thomas.  Even Anger's book from which you quote is based on St. Thomas' theology.  Furthermore, your weightiest authority, "The Catechism of the Council of Trent," was ordered published by Pope Pius V, who, being a Dominican, was probably himself biased in favor of St. Thomas.

Reply to First Objection

165.  Reply Obj. 1:  My purpose in this monograph is not to "show both sides."  It is up to the "Liturgical Commission" to attempt a defense of their new, bogus "Canon."

166.  Secondly, until a noisy and dedicated clique of Modernists and "Progressives" undertook the task of downgrading St. Thomas, he had always been regarded as the authority par excellence.  In their encyclicals, decrees, etc., no Pope of memory has failed to quote the Angelic Doctor at one time or another.  As to Pope Pius V, he is, of course, a canonized saint; and therefore it follows that his only "biases" were towards those things which are good.

Second Objection

167.  Objection 2:  Nevertheless, isn't it true that the position of St. Thomas which you have adopted (namely, claiming the necessity of all the words This is the Chalice of My Blood . . . unto the forgiveness of sins) is still only an opinion?

Reply to Second Objection

168.  Reply Obj. 2:  Yes; at least it was only an opinion when St. Thomas wrote it.  However, much more weight was added to it when The Catechism by Decree of THE HOLY COUNCIL OF TRENT, an ecuмenical council, adopted the same position.  "The ecuмenical councils," wrote Pope Leo XIII, "have always been careful to hold Thomas Aquinas in singular honor.  In the councils of Lyons, Vienna, Florence, and the Vatican one might almost say that Thomas took part and presided over the deliberations and decrees of the Fathers."  "But the chief and special glory of Thomas," continues the Pontiff, "one which he has shared with none of the Catholic Doctors, is that the Fathers of Trent made it part of the order of the conclave to lay upon the altar, together with the code of sacred Scripture and the decrees of the Supreme Pontiffs, the Summa of Thomas Aquinas, whence to seek counsel, reason, and inspiration." (Encyclical letter Aeterni Patris).

Third Objection

169.  Objection 3:  Undoubtedly there has been no greater exponent and exegete of St. Thomas than the Dominican Cardinal Cajetan.  Called a "lamp of the Church" by Pope Clement VII, Cajetan reputedly could quote the entire Summa from Memory.  Yet Cajetan disagreed with St. Thomas on this very point! - namely, that all the words which follow This is the Chalice of My Blood are essential for the form.

Reply to Third Objection

170.  Reply Obj. 3:  Yes, and when Pope St. Pius V ordered Cajetan's works to be published in 1570, he commanded this particular opinion to be expurgated!  This was Christ acting through Peter.

Fourth Objection

171.  Objection 4:  The "Catholic Dictionary and Encyclopedia" by Addis and Arnold states (p. 216): "Probably the mere words 'This is my body,' 'This is my blood' would suffice for validity."

Reply to Fourth Objection

172.  Reply Obj. 4:  Though it is difficult to agree even with "probably" let us assume, purely for the sake of argument, that this conjecture is correct.  From time immemorial up until just recently all Roman Catholics everywhere always had certainty - the certainty of faith - that by the words of consecration The Real Presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament was effected.  Now are we to be satisfied with probably?

Fifth Objection

173.  Objection 5:  A very authoritative source, namely, Noldin's Summa Theologiae Moralis, states that This is the Chalice of My Blood or else This is My Blood, and these words alone, are necessary in the consecration of the chalice.  "Et haec quidem sola in consecratione calicis sunt essentialia," (III, De Sacramentis, par. 120).

Reply to Fifth Objection

174.  Reply Obj. 5:  In Part 12 above, my opinion contrary to this was proffered; however let us assume, for argument's sake, that this opinion of Noldin is correct.  Nevertheless the point is that in the present situation it has no bearing for the following reasons:

 (a)  The priest does not say only these words, but he says more.  And at least part of this "more" that he says in the new "form" is a mutation, or rather a mutilation of the proper, established form.  Secondly,

 (b)  as was pointed out earlier in the present monograph, a sacrament can very easily be invalidated by the addition of words, even if all the necessary words are pronounced.

175.  Thirdly, (c) the mutilation in question (to wit, "for all men so that, etc.") is a forgery of Christ's words recorded in Holy Writ, which forgery conveys a meaning totally foreign to and in conflict with the true meaning of the reality of this sacrament, which is the union of the Mystical Body.

176.  Furthermore (d) the same authority Noldin goes on to say in paragraph 122 that the words of consecration must be pronounced without mutation either of the essential part or the incidental part.  "Verba consecrationis proferenda sunt sine mutatione tum sunstantiali tum accidentali,"  (Noldin's emphasis).

177.  Also, (e) St. Alphonsus calls to our attention the following from the rubrics of the Missal: "If anyone abbreviates or changes something of the form of consecration, and the words do not signify the same thing, he does not confect the Sacrament."  ("Si quis autem aliquid diminueret vel immutaret de forma consecrationis, et verba idem non significarent, non conficeret sacramentum.")

178.  And, finally, therefore (f) even if we grant, for argument's sake, that the words This is My Blood, alone, would suffice for the consecration of the wine, it is amply manifest from all sources that the "essential part" (whatever it may be) coupled with a mutation at least places the validity of the sacrament in doubt.  Moreover, it is also universally agreed that this is always a grave sin on the part of the priest.  Thus St. Alphonsus states: "graviter tamen peccaret qui aliqua ex reliquis omitteret vel mutaret"; that is, "nevertheless he would gravely sin who would omit or change anything of the remaining words."  (By "remaining words" St. Alphonsus means here all those words which follow This is the Chalice of My Blood.).

Sixth Objection

179.  Objection 6:  Even if the form is now in invalid, as you are claiming, it would seem that the good intentions of the priest and the recipients would make up for this deficiency.

Reply to Sixth Objection

180.  Reply Obj. 6:  That is absurd.  If the "form" used for a sacrament is an invalid form, then nothing can make the sacrament valid, as a sacrament.  According to the line of reasoning in this Objection, one may now receive the sacrament of Penance by merely having the good intention of going to Confession.  The sacraments are held to be "ex opere operato" and if the aforesaid Objection were true, a sacrament would, no longer be a sacrament.

Seventh Objection

181.  Objection 7:  Your whole thesis is based on a fundamental misunderstanding.  Don't you know that in the language of Holy Scripture the word "many" is often to be taken as meaning "all"?  "According to the best authorities, and Pope Benedict XIV among others," says Rev. John O'Brien, "the word 'many' is here to be taken as meaning all, a mode of expression by no means uncommon in the Holy Scripture.  St. Thomas Aquinas also interprets it in this way.  If taken in any other sense it would hardly be possible to keep free of the Calvinistic error that our Lord died only for a certain class of persons." (O'Brien, op. cit., p. 331).

Reply to Seventh Objection

182.  Reply Obj. 7:  This TOTALLY erroneous paragraph penned by Father John O'Brien is disturbing enough.  Even more disturbing is the fact that the book wherein it appears was published in 1881 and bears the Imprimatur of John Cardinal McCloskey.  Now, in the first place, Father O'Brien's claim would make a mockery of Saint Pius V and his CATECHISM by Decree of THE HOLY COUNCIL OF TRENT.  The reader will recall that earlier in this monograph we quoted a passage from this CATECHISM which begins thus: "With reason, therefore, were the words for all not used." (!)  Or wasn't this saintly Pope aware that the word many "is here to be taken as meaning all."??

183.  That Father O'Brien would actually use Benedict XIV and St. Thomas as authorities to prove his point is incredible!  Because they both held exactly the opposite of what Father O'Brien is trying to "prove."  This quotation of St. Alphonsus (who has never been suspected of being a Calvinist) needs repeating here: "The words Pro vobis et pro multis ('For you and for many') are used to distinguish the virtue of the blood of Christ from its fruits; for the blood of our Savior is of sufficient value to save all men, but its fruits are applicable only to a certain number and not to all, and this is their own fault.  . . . This is the explanation of St. Thomas, as quoted by Benedict XIV."  (Emphasis added).

184.  Readily is it granted that any "theologian" who has not grasped the fundamental difference between the aspects of sufficiency and efficacy most certainly would himself be prone to fall into "Calvinistic errors" as well as a whole host of other errors.  Witness the example of the all-English Canon.  Now in this present situation the majority of the American Bishops clearly and obviously are tolerating (and, indeed, in some cases abetting,) unorthodox theologians of this caliber.  No truly orthodox Roman Catholic who is desirous of saving his soul can sit by idly and tolerate this assault from within upon THE Faith and upon the One, True, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, Roman Church.

Eighth Objection

185.  Objection 8:  Don't the American Bishops have the right and the authority to introduce a new form for the consecration?

Reply to Eighth Objection

186.  Reply Obj. 8:  "As for the alleged right of local Churches to reform their rites freely, we are not aware in what quarter you have sought for illustrations of its exercise . . . (T)o remodel the existing rites in the most drastic manner, is a proposition for which we know of no historical foundation, and which appears to us absolutely incredible.  Hence Cranmer, in taking this unprecedented course, acted, in our opinion, with the most inconceivable rashness."  (Vindication of the Bull 'Apostolicae Curae'.)

Ninth Objection

187.  Objection 9:  (This "objection" is placed within quotation marks because it comprises the exact words a certain Archbishop wrote to me after I had called to his attention the mutilation: for all men, etc. in the new consecration "form.") "It is interesting to note here that the form of consecration used in the Mass goes back even before the Gospels to the primitive liturgy which was used in the Church before the gospels and before the epistles of St. Paul were written."

Reply to Ninth Objection

188.  Reply Obj. 9:  This is an old artifice, the Anglican Schismatics having used exactly the same pretext.  "They knew only too well," said Pope Leo XIII, "the infinite bond which unites faith with worship, 'the law of belief with the law of prayer' (lex credendi, lex orandi) and so, under the pretext of restoring it to its primitive form, they corrupted the order of the liturgy in many ways, to adapt it to the errors of the innovators."  (Bull Apostolicae Curae, emphasis added).

189.  Elaborating further in the Vindication of the Bull, the English Bishops said, "It could not have been, as you seem to suggest, because the Reformers wished to go back to what was primitive, for they cut out with an unsparing hand the most ancient as well as the most modern portions of the Catholic rite."  (Emphasis added).

Tenth Objection

190.  Objection 10:  What if the present Pope or some subsequent pope should declare that this new "form" is perfectly all right?

Reply to Tenth Objection

191.  Reply Obj. 10:  This no bona fide pope could do, for the Church never contradicts Herself.  Any claim that the Pope himself has canonized this new "form" would have to be investigated carefully.  Now if it were true that some pope, with full knowledge and understanding and consent, had approved it, then faith and reason would dictate to us that we had on our hands at best another Liberius, and at worst another Honorius.  Let us hear Father Francis Clark, "The only formulae that infallibly and necessarily contain the essential significance of a sacrament are those which have been canonized by being instituted by Christ and His Church for that purpose.  Such words, when exactly reproduced, are removed beyond the reach of ambiguity or private distortion."

192.  "Where, however," Father Clark continues, "a new liturgical form is
introduced and no such canonized formula is employed (and since it signifies falsely, the form: "for all men so that, etc." cannot become canonized legitimately - Auth.), there cannot be certainty of its validity until its credentials have been established, and it has been acknowledged, expressly or implicitly, by the universal Church."  (Francis Clark, S.J., Anglican Orders and Defect of Intention, pp. 182-3, emphasis added).

Eleventh Objection

193.  Objection 11:  You cannot hold responsible all those priests who are using the new Canon.  They are only obeying their Bishops.

Reply to Eleventh Objection

194.  Reply Obj. 11:  When all the Bishops of England were saying, "Aye, my Lord, my King" - save one, the courageous St. John Fisher - all those priests who followed into heresy and schism were, of course, "only obeying their bishops."

195.  According to Cardinal Newman, on the eve of the Council of Nicaea, when all the world was "going Arian," eighty percent of the bishops were fully prepared formally to deny the Divinity of Christ.  This wholesale apostasy was averted only because Almighty God chose to raise up at that moment His instrument, that eloquent and incomparable soldier of Jesus Christ, St. Athanasius.

196.  A writer in The Wanderer (Feb. 22, 1968) repudiates comparisons between the conduct of our present-day Bishops and that of the 16th century English Bishops who were "an apostate Hierarchy" and "had previously broken off communications with Rome and were excommunicated."  Perhaps this writer is awaiting a formal announcement in The New York Times.  If our Bishops have invalidated one of the seven sacraments instituted by Our Lord Jesus Christ, they have thereby, in effect, denied that Sacrament.  By denying this particular Sacrament one corrupts the dogmas of The Real Presence, Transubstantiation as defined by the Council of Trent, and the doctrine of The Mystical Body of Christ.  St. Thomas Aquinas defines heresy as "a species of unbelief, belonging to those who profess the Christian faith, but corrupt its dogmas." (Summa Th., II-II, Q. 11, Art. 1).

Twelfth Objection

197.  Objection 12:  Your arguments simply cannot be right.  It defies all reason that so many Bishops, priests and laymen could go so far astray.

Reply to Twelfth Objection

198.  Reply Obj. 12:  That magnificent Pope of our own century, the intrepid Saint Pius X, warned us and fortold to us, "Their real aims, their plots, the line they are following are well known to all of you, . . . What they propose is a UNIVERSAL APOSTASY still worse than the one which threatened the century of Charles (Borromeo), from the fact that it creeps insidious and hidden in the very veins of the Church and with extreme subtlety pushes erroneous principles to their extreme conclusions.

199.  "But both have the same origin in 'the enemy who,' ever alert for the perdition of men, 'has oversowed cockle among the wheat' (Matt. 13, 25); of both revolts the ways are hidden and darksome, with the same development and the same fatal issue. . . . Truly a spectacle full of sadness for the present and of menace for the future . . . especially for those who foment with the most activity or who tolerate with the most indifference this pestiferous wind of impiety."  (Encyclical letter Editae Saepe, May 26, 1910, emphasis added).

200.  This same Saint Pius X, the humble Giuseppe Sarto, when congratulated by his Mother upon his appointment as Bishop of Mantua, replied to her: "Mother, you do not realize what it means to be a Bishop.  I shall lose my soul if I neglect my duty."  May Almighty God raise up for us today Athanasiuses and John Fishers!

Thirteenth Objection

201.  Objection 13:  What course can a priest take?  Can't he be forced under obedience to use the new Canon?

Reply to Thirteenth Objection

202.  Reply Obj. 13:  In all cases of doubt, the more certain course must be taken.  The ancient form of consecration in Latin is by all means the most certain.

203.  No priest can be forced to use this new "Canon,"  He can always have recourse to the decree Quo Primum, issued on July 19, 1570, by Pope Saint Pius V, which states inter alia:

"We determine and order by this Our decree, to be valid in perpetuity, that never shall anything be added to, omitted from or changed in this Missal . . .

"Specifically do We warn all persons in authority, of whatever dignity or rank, Cardinals not excluded, and command them as a matter of strict obedience never to use or permit any ceremonies or Mass prayers other than the ones contained in this Missal . . . (This decree, in its entirety, is printed in every official altar missal.)

"At no time in the future can a priest, whether secular or order priest, ever be forced to use any other way of saying Mass.  And in order once and for all to preclude any scruples of conscience and fear of ecclesiastical Penalties and censures, We declare herewith that it is by virtue of Our Apostolic Authority that We decree and prescribe that this present order and decree of Ours is to last in perpetuity, and never at a future date can it be revoked or amended legally. . .

 "And if, nevertheless, anyone would ever dare attempt any action contrary to this order of Ours, handed down for all times, let him know that he has incurred the wrath of Almighty God, and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.

 (Emphasis added throughout)