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Author Topic: Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy  (Read 3679 times)

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Offline Matthew

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Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy
« on: April 12, 2019, 02:47:27 PM »
NOTE: This is purely a hypothetical scenario. I have no intention to demean Independent priests, or to infer that they are any more likely per-capita to offer sloppy Masses than priests belonging to some other organization.

An SSPX priest offering a meticulous, liturgically perfect High Mass at St. Isidore's (a building that was built by Trads, and looks like an actual church) with top-notch equipment, plenty of servers who practice regularly, accompanied by a beautiful well-rehearsed schola of 12 men, surrounded by 500 Faithful and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of art, statues, architecture...

...is in the same canonical status, and is just as "disobedient", as ...

some laid-back "independent priest" saying Mass quickly and/or sloppily in a hotel or garage with poor/minimal equipment, using a single altar server who barely knows the responses, for a single family of 5.


Both operate under supplied jurisdiction and are 100% -- not 90%, 99% or 99.9% -- as legitimate as each other.

Let that sink in. Some SSPXers really need to internalize this truth!

Re: Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy
« Reply #1 on: April 13, 2019, 11:54:15 AM »

some laid-back "independent priest" saying Mass quickly and/or sloppily in a hotel or garage with poor/minimal equipment, using a single altar server who barely knows the responses, for a single family of 5.


I have a technical issue with this part:

Saying Mass quickly and/or sloppily is sacrilegious and for the most part, I don't think independent priests do it.

In their struggles, they've learned to provide reverence to the Most Perfect Sacrifice and worship to God the Father.


On the contrary, I do think the neo-SSPX is purposefully instructing their priest to celebrate "Speed Masses".

A neo-SSPX "Speed Mass" is where the priests and altar servers utter rapid, monotone Latin responses without inflection or reverent pauses.  The pace is so fast that the faithful can't keep-up with them in their missals.   It seems they want the faithful to think they are very busy men who need to finish-up Mass to attend to other important business.  It is sacrilegious.

Now, if you ask them, they won't admit their "Speed Masses" were instructed by Menzingen on-down through the management chain, all the way to Fr. Le Roux and the seminary.  

I've seen Speed Masses throughout their chapels and the offenders are mainly the new priests and the older generation of political sycophants, like Fr. Asher.  This late vocation Texan is notorious for having:  "The fastest Mass in the West"

If you compare the older (Bp. Williamson seminary era) SSPX priest's Mass speeds, they are significantly slower and more reverent.  

I submit that this Mass speed issue can be measured and docuмented to show a "significant correlation", between new and old SSPX priests.

In conclusion, ask yourself, "Why would the new SSPX embrace speeding through the Mass Liturgy?"

Would inculcating a Speed Mass and the resulting disrespect for the Tridentine Liturgy be a likely a prelude to embracing a hybrid mass ?

Is it a coincidence that Bp Fellay's favorite Pope, Benedict XVI, has made statements of instituting a hybrid mass more than once?



Offline Matthew

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Re: Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy
« Reply #2 on: April 13, 2019, 12:01:31 PM »
WHOOSH!

You totally missed the point. My post was not meant to compliment the SSPX, nor to criticize independent priests. I had hoped that people would understand my point -- apparently I have to spell everything out in laborious detail.

I was drawing up a hypothetical, and since the first large "pre-Vatican II church" looking chapel I could think of was St. Isidore's, I went with the SSPX to be the elaborate Mass. By process of elimination, that left the Independent to be "the simple and sloppy" Mass I was contrasting with.

But it's more than that. Which is more likely to have simpler organization structure, less money in the bank, simpler chapels, smaller congregations, etc.? Independents of course. My point is that the SSPX, due to its size, money, power, years in business, etc. often manages to dazzle the Faithful into confusing it with the pre-Vatican II Catholic Church itself. "Outside the Church there is no salvation. Ergo, outside the SSPX there is no salvation!"

Although a Mass said too fast would indeed be a sacrilege, it wouldn't affect its canonical status, which is the only thing I'm discussing here.

Re: Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy
« Reply #3 on: April 13, 2019, 12:09:45 PM »
WHOOSH!

You totally missed the point. My post was not meant to compliment the SSPX, nor to criticize independent priests. I had hoped that people would understand my point -- apparently I have to spell everything out in laborious detail.

I was drawing up a hypothetical, and since the first large "pre-Vatican II church" looking chapel I could think of was St. Isidore's, I went with the SSPX to be the elaborate Mass. By process of elimination, that left the Independent to be "the simple and sloppy" Mass I was contrasting with.

But it's more than that. Which is more likely to have simpler organization structure, less money in the bank, simpler chapels, smaller congregations, etc.? Independents of course. My point is that the SSPX, due to its size, money, power, years in business, etc. often manages to dazzle the Faithful into confusing it with the pre-Vatican II Catholic Church itself. "Outside the Church there is no salvation. Ergo, outside the SSPX there is no salvation!"

Although a Mass said too fast would indeed be a sacrilege, it wouldn't affect its canonical status, which is the only thing I'm discussing here.

Acknowledge your point Matthew.

I got it the first time, but your inclusion of "quick & sloppy" rang a bell and I had to answer it :farmer:

The Speed Mass issue is for another topic.

Offline Matthew

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Re: Thought for the day - SSPX deluxe vs. Independent sloppy
« Reply #4 on: April 13, 2019, 12:11:59 PM »
It blows my mind every time I think about it: a small chapel with ZERO in the bank is just as legit as the SSPX which has millions.
A small chapel started in a warehouse or garage last year is just as legit as an SSPX chapel that started in 1975.
A huge chapel church like St. Isidore's packed with 500 parishioners is just as legit as a garage chapel with 1 family in attendance.
A huge, almost 50 year old organization like the SSPX is just as legit as the SAJM which started recently.

Supplied jurisdiction is given by the Church to both, in equal measure.

...and let's not forget:

The SSPX with hundreds of priests has just as much authority to "play Pope", put its foot down, or make definitive decisions on theological controversies -- individually as priests or collectively as a Council -- as a single independent priest.

These statements appear to be boring, common sense assertions that everyone accepts. But do they? Human nature is apt to be dazzled by numbers, appearances, glitz, legacy, reputation, and so on.

I've actually spoken in person with SSPX parishioners who are thus dazzled. They can offer no concrete reasons why the SSPX is somehow more legit or somehow less disobedient than, say, a Resistance chapel. It's all about FEELINGS. When you go to an SSPX chapel, it FEELS more legit for all the reasons I listed above.