Eleison Comments by His Excellency Bishop Richard Williamson  
Number CDXXXVIII (438)
 
 December 5, 2015
 
 
Novus Ordo Missae – III
Catholics, be generous! Recognize God’s goal
To save, outside “Tradition,” many a soul.

If the evidence for eucharistic miracles taking place within the Novus Ordo Church (see EC 436 and 437) is as serious as it seems, then Catholics must conform their minds to the mind of God, and not the other way round. And Catholics cleaving to Tradition have a special need to work out what God meant by the miracles, because they will not easily understand what he can have meant, when they know how distasteful to him the Novus Ordo Mass (NOM) must be in itself.

For many centuries God has been working such miracles. The primary reason has always been to strengthen the faith of Catholics in a truth of the Faith not easy to believe, but very close to the Heart of God. That after the Consecration at Mass of the bread and wine God himself takes the place of their substance is an occurrence so outside the normal course of nature that this invention of the love of God wishing to give himself as food and drink to his sheep may be practical, but it seems also incredible. So in due time and place God has wrought visible miracles in some shape or form to help doubting souls to believe. A secondary reason for these miracles, especially where there has been some profanation or other of the Holy Eucharist, is to remind Catholics of the sacred treatment and adoration always due to the humble appearances behind which hides God himself.

Both of these reasons apply today when the NOM has severely diminished the sense of the Real Presence without always nullifying it (see EC 437). Who can deny that the rite of the NOM and its practice throughout the Novus Ordo Church, e.g Communion standing and in the hand, have set countless Catholics on their way to disbelieving in the Real Presence, and countless priests on their way to a lack of due respect in their handling of the Holy Eucharist? Who can deny that both disbelief and disrespect towards it have hugely increased since the NOM was introduced in 1969? Humanly speaking, the wonder may be not that there have been miracles at all within the framework of the NOM, but that there have not been many more. In any case, God knows best.

However, these miracles – always assuming they are authentic – have lessons also for the Catholics of Tradition who have to some extent or another stood back from the Novus Ordo framework. The lesson most obvious is that not all Novus Ordo Masses are invalid, nor all Novus Ordo episcopal Consecrations nor all priestly Ordinations, as “Traditionalists” can be tempted to think. This is surely because while since the 1960’s a mass of Catholic sheep have become too worldly to deserve to keep the true rite of Mass, they have loved the Mass enough not to lose it altogether. The NOM may have been allowed by God to make it easier for Catholics to leave the Faith if they wanted to, but not impossible to keep it if they wanted to.

Therefore the NOM and the Novus Ordo Church as a whole are dangerous for the Faith, and Catholics are right who have clung to Tradition to avoid the danger. But as they have had to put a distance between themselves and the mainstream Church, so they have exposed themselves to the opposite danger of an isolation leading to a sectarian and even pharisaical spirit, disconnected from reality. There are true sacraments in the Novus Ordo and true Catholics, for whom God cares, and “Traditionalists” should be happy that there are. Let Traditionalists’ relative isolation not make them feel that they are bound to deny that there is anything Catholic at all left in the Novus Ordo. That is unreal, and reality’s pendulum will swing back, as with the leadership of the SSPX, presently failing to see the on-going need for isolation from the mainstream Church. No. Tradition still needs isolation, but with a generous and not an isolationist spirit.

Kyrie eleison.
 
 

There are true sacraments in the Novus Ordo and true Catholics, for whom God cares, and “Traditionalists” should be happy that there are. Let Traditionalists’ relative isolation not make them feel that they are bound to deny that there is anything Catholic at all left in the Novus Ordo. That is unreal, and reality’s pendulum will swing back, as with the leadership of the SSPX, presently failing to see the on-going need for isolation from the mainstream Church. No. Tradition still needs isolation, but with a generous and not an isolationist spirit.

I'm sorry but this is like a rerun of the late 60s. "Tradition still needs isolation, but with a generous and not an isolationist spirit spirit of compromise."

What the heck?

+Williamson has up to now it seems that with modern Rome 2+2=5. With these two ECs on the Nervous Ohno mess, has His Excellency fallen into the Party"s requirement of doublethink?

The NOM may have been allowed by God to make it easier for Catholics to leave the Faith if they wanted to, but not impossible to keep it if they wanted to.  - Bishop Williamson


Is Bishop Williamson really saying that God allowed the NOM so people could leave the Catholic Faith?  

Quote from: 2Vermont

The NOM may have been allowed by God to make it easier for Catholics to leave the Faith if they wanted to, but not impossible to keep it if they wanted to.  - Bishop Williamson


Is Bishop Williamson really saying that God allowed the NOM so people could leave the Catholic Faith?  

The NO was allowed by God as a punishment towards those who wanted to leave the Faith. Many already had one foot out the door, He withheld His grace from people who rejected it anyway, and allowed the door to be flung open by the NO.

 

Why couldn't people leave the Faith without the NO?  IT seems to me that this is just an excuse for the NO.  

It's telling that +Williamson asks for Traditionalists to be generous in spirit towards their NO counterparts, the people, and the reaction is so negative. Apparently it's exactly what needed to be said. In a hardliner milieu this is very un-PC of him. And people don't like it. He's doing what he does best, it's just on the other foot.

This EC was only about our NO counterparts, the "people"?  That's not how I read it.  My posts have nothing to do with the "people".  

Quote from: wallflower

It's telling that +Williamson asks for Traditionalists to be generous in spirit towards their NO counterparts, the people, and the reaction is so negative. Apparently it's exactly what needed to be said. In a hardliner milieu this is very un-PC of him. And people don't like it. He's doing what he does best, it's just on the other foot.

This EC was only about our NO counterparts, the "people"?  That's not how I read it.  My posts have nothing to do with the "people".  

I think this sums up what's been going on with the last 3 ECs. Many comments in the past few weeks have made me wonder if we are all reading the same thing. But I think we are focusing on different things depending on where we are coming from.

Sedes are very focused on the fact that +Williamson is admitting (not for the first time) that there are devout priests and valid sacraments in the NO, however rare. This is a problem for a sede and whoever else there is in between (I can't keep up with all the "ists").

Regular R&R's are less shocked by it since that's what we've always believed anyway.

For myself, I am focused on what he is saying about being generous towards the people. I realize now that that is likely based on recent conversions among my family from the NO to tradition. People who mocked us and that we never would have dreamed would eventually be asking questions decades later. So aside from tending that way anyway, current experiences are adding to the personal focus for me. But I don't think it's all me. +Williamson is actually stressing how God loves and cares for them. He's repeated it several times and I don't think that I am imagining that his care for them is driving these last EC's.



 

Eleison Comments by His Excellency Bishop Richard Williamson  
Number CDXXXVIII (438)
 
(...) There are true sacraments in the Novus Ordo and true Catholics, for whom God cares, and “Traditionalists” should be happy that there are. Let Traditionalists’ relative isolation not make them feel that they are bound to deny that there is anything Catholic at all left in the Novus Ordo. That is unreal, and reality’s pendulum will swing back, as with the leadership of the SSPX, presently failing to see the on-going need for isolation from the mainstream Church. No. Tradition still needs isolation, but with a generous and not an isolationist spirit.

And when the Roman deal with the SSPX is published where will + Williamson be then ? As the English hymn puts it: "Full in the panting heart of Rome, beneath the Apostle's crowning dome".


Full in the panting heart of Rome
Beneath the apostle’s crowning dome.
From pilgrim’s lips that kiss the ground,
Breathes in all tongues one only sound:

GOD BLESS OUR POPE, GOD BLESS OUR POPE,
GOD BLESS OUR POPE, THE GREAT THE GOOD!

The golden roof, the marble walls,
The Vatican’s majestic halls,
The note redoubles, till it fills
With echoes sweet the seven hills

GOD BLESS OUR POPE, GOD BLESS OUR POPE,
GOD BLESS OUR POPE, THE GREAT THE GOOD!

Then surging through each hallowed gate,
Where martyrs glory, in peace await
It sweeps beyond the solemn plain,
Peals over Alps, across the main.

GOD BLESS OUR POPE, GOD BLESS OUR POPE,
GOD BLESS OUR POPE, THE GREAT THE GOOD!

From torrid south to frozen north,
The wave harmonious stretches forth,
Yet strikes no chord more true to Rome’s,
Than rings within our hearts and homes.

GOD BLESS OUR POPE, GOD BLESS OUR POPE,
GOD BLESS OUR POPE, THE GREAT THE GOOD!

– Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman, Archbishop of Westminster (1802 – 1865)

Just getting you ready for the next EC !