Author Topic: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary? (Read 9738 times)

claudel · « **Reply #45 on:** October 05, 2018, 02:19:45 PM »

Quote from: Cantarella on October 05, 2018, 01:07:24 PM

… I love representations of Our Lord triumphant and resurrected, as well. Just not placed on a cross.

All well and good, Cantarella. No Catholic is obliged to like or dislike any image purporting to illustrate an aspect of the Divine nature or of salvation history. Put otherwise, any such representation, however orthodox in intent or expression, is merely an illustration. As such, its relationship to core matters of the faith is necessarily peripheral.

With regard to the papal statement you quoted earlier, however, Pius XII was not derogating the Christ the King crucifix. Rather, he was referring, as his words precisely indicate, to the specifically Protestant abuse of misrepresenting the stripped Christ on the cross as an unwounded, impassive figure. The affective response to such an image is ipso facto unrelated to that prompted by the Christ the King crucifix. Pius XII was complaining about tainted apples, not completely sound oranges.

Speaking more generally, I am sure that I am not alone in noting either the puerility or the bad faith of those who—consequent to my first comment and, far more so, to Benzel's striking image and comments—after being compelled to abandon their initial ill-informed claim that the Christ the King crucifix is untraditional and ahistoric, now defend the hastily assembled fallback position that it is decisively tainted by its lack of depictional realism.

The fallback, alas, has grave problems of its own. This is a delicate matter, but surely a few hereabouts are aware that ancient Roman sources make distastefully clear that crucifixion, as standardly practiced by Roman authorities in both Republican and Imperial times, was intended to maximize the victim's pain and humiliation and also to maximize the onlookers' awareness that such a fate awaited them if they transgressed to a similar extent. An integral part of maximized humiliation was that the victim was crucified absolutely naked—that is, there was no such accommodation to ordinary human dignity as retention of a loincloth. In other words, as nothing in the Gospel accounts suggest that the Roman authorities in Judaea authorized an unconventional crucifixion—let alone that the bloodthirsty Jєωs would have requested it—no morally tolerable representation of Our Lord's crucifixion would ever be true to its extremely likely, extremely shocking manifestation.

May I add that I trust that even Neil will have the decency not to accuse me of calling here for stark naked representations of Our Savior on His Cross.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #46 on:** October 05, 2018, 03:30:57 PM »

Quote from: claudel on October 05, 2018, 02:19:45 PM

With regard to the papal statement you quoted earlier, however, Pius XII was not derogating the Christ the King crucifix. Rather, he was referring, as his words precisely indicate, to the specifically Protestant abuse of misrepresenting the stripped Christ on the cross as an unwounded, impassive figure. The affective response to such an image is ipso facto unrelated to that prompted by the Christ the King crucifix. Pius XII was complaining about tainted apples, not completely sound oranges.

Actually, his intent there was the condemnation of "antiquarianism", this notion that older always was better and more pure ... with the implicit idea that over time the purity of Church tradition became corrupted by the human accretion. This did not mean a rejection of the older at all. So, for instance, when he said that we should not reject polyphony, he was not thereby saying that it's better than Gregorian Chant. Same thing with images of the crucifixion. I agree that one is not inherently better than another. Unless some error can be detected as implied in the rendering, it's just a matter of taste and, for liturgical use, what has been approved the authority. I don't care for these myself, but I don't find anything wrong with them or inherently objectionable. Could they be seen as part of a broader slide into Modernist sensibilities? Yes, of course. And the reason these differ from Resurrectifixes I have already articulated. Our Lord was not on the cross after His Resurrection, but He can be viewed as being a King whose throne was the cross, that He reigns from the cross. I like the symbolism, but I don't like the regal trappings. I think that there's a reason that Our Lord chose to show Himself in so degrading a fashion, to demonstrate the humility of His rule vs. that of worldly monarchs, and to be stumbling-block for the pride ... as only the truly humble can recognize Him for Who He is amid the degradation.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #47 on:** October 05, 2018, 03:37:58 PM »

Quote from: Cantarella on October 05, 2018, 01:04:37 PM

I think that what is important in crucifixes is that they maintain the visible signs of cruel suffering in Christ's corpus, as Pope Pius XII was stating here. Otherwise, they are just crosses, quite inappropriate in altars where the Sacrifice of the Mass is celebrated.

If you read Pius XII that way, that he was stating a preference for the suffering images of Our Lord Crucified, then you would also have to read him as stating that polyphony is better than or preferrable to Gregorian Chant ... which the Church has never held. We studied this Encyclical at STAS under Bishop Williamson, and the intent is to condemn the principle that "old is good" and "new is bad" in Church custom. Then, of course, the Modernists warp the idea of what "old" was (since we don't have detailed descriptions from the early years) ... turning it into a minimalist view of the Liturgy, for instance. They claim that because we don't have full liturgical texts, the original priests just sat around in a cirlce, ad libbed liturgical stuff, and played loose with form and ritual. Nothing could be father from the truth, as little was more foreign to the Jєωιѕн mind than to have formless worship. I could go on for a long time about this error. We lacked detailed liturgical books because of the widespread persecution. Once the persecution abated, the liturgical texts surfaced ... and these accurately convey what had been all along.

Prayerful · « **Reply #48 on:** October 05, 2018, 04:55:19 PM »

Quote from: Cantarella on October 03, 2018, 09:39:23 PM

Still better than this:

What's up with all these ugly crosses?

That first thing is a exactly a Stang with the nail and wooden V, a Satanic symbol used in witchcraft, and given to him by a 30 yo woman wearing an occult or Wiccan bracelet. The youth rally too was also an occasion of astonishing immodesty. Archbishop Lefebvre remarked that Conciliar Catholicism was a New Religion. A New Religion, and not clearly the Christian one.

Matthew · « **Reply #49 on:** October 06, 2018, 08:59:26 AM »

Quote from: Ladislaus on October 05, 2018, 03:30:57 PM

I think that there's a reason that Our Lord chose to show Himself in so degrading a fashion, to demonstrate the humility of His rule vs. that of worldly monarchs, and to be stumbling-block for the pride ... as only the truly humble can recognize Him for Who He is amid the degradation.

I think this is why the Christ the King crucifix appeals to the neo-SSPX. They are high on themselves, high on pride, and they don't have in themselves the humility expressed by the classic Crucifix. They think they will save the Church, succeed where so many other groups failed, etc.

The Neo-SSPX is the group that built a huge, expensive, brand new seminary in Virginia to accommodate the influx of seminarians from the Indult and Novus Ordo. They are all about taking a high place.

...rather than humbly holding the True Faith inviolate, continuing to be called bad names by the World and various evil men and organizations, and letting God do the exalting on His own good time.

That's why they enlisted the expensive services of a corporate branding agency. Rather than patiently trust in God to send more people into the SSPX, or winning over new souls by their PRAYERS, spotless example, and timeless Catholic doctrine, they went hat-in-hand to the Jєωιѕн "human nature" experts on Madison Avenue to use psychology tricks and techniques on the Catholic population -- techniques normally used to sell soap or corn flakes.

You have to admit I'm right about this -- the SSPX is much more accepted now than they were in, say, the early 2000's. Almost no one calls them bad names anymore. Those names are reserved for the Resistance and other faithful Traditional Catholic groups here and there. Hmmm....

Pax Vobis · « **Reply #50 on:** October 06, 2018, 09:28:21 AM »

Quote

The Neo-SSPX is the group that built a huge, expensive, brand new seminary in Virginia to accommodate the influx of seminarians from the Indult and Novus Ordo. They are all about taking a high place.

...rather than humbly holding the True Faith inviolate, continuing to be called bad names by the World and various evil men and organizations, and letting God do the exalting on His own good time.

Agree. And how many comments have we heard recently about how some people don't like going to a hotel room for mass? Or they prefer a "nice" church over a rented conference room? I mean, is this mentality catholic? Isn't the Mass more important than where it's said? Sounds like some people have twisted materialistic-catholicism attitude or want a calvinist-rewarder-God religion. Explains why the sspx "looks down" on the resistance/independents - because they know most people care about image and self-respect than truth. Also explains why most will accept a deal with rome. So sad and short-sighted.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #51 on:** October 06, 2018, 01:58:15 PM »

Quote from: Cantarella on October 05, 2018, 01:07:24 PM

I agree and this is another point as well. There is a deep incongruity between the cross (suffering) and the resurrected Christ (triumph). When you place the two together, it just looks bad, in my opinion.

I love representations of Our Lord triumphant and resurrected, as well. Just not placed on a cross.

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The deep incongruity of placing the two together artists call juxtaposition, then they take that and turn it into an artistic expression.
Artists are constantly groping for the unusual and extreme, to become known for being a pioneer in the art world.
They have to be careful not to cross the line of decency -- but these days some take extra pride in shocking the viewer.
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It seems to me Newchurch is so afraid of being accused of offending non-Catholics (especially Jєωs) that they make changes.
They take away traditional Catholic elements of our worship and replace them with what won't offend.

Read: something that isn't perceived as "anti-Semitic."

Jєωs hate the Cross.
Jєωs hate the Crucifix.
Jєωs hate Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Rabbis teach his natural father was a demon and Christ cast out devils by the power of his father, the devil.
It's in Scripture.
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Well, they can't make Jєωs happy all the time, but to "meet them halfway" they're not averse to taking away the Crucifix.
They do that by removing the INRI
(which the Pharisees of Our Lord's time tried to remove but Pilate rejected their appeal. He told them, "What I have written, I have written." Good for him! He stood his ground. Not too surprising for a Roman).
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By removing the INRI they make the thing no longer a Crucifix.
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Any object cursorily looking like a cross, but missing the INRI, is not a Crucifix.
It stands for "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jєωs," written in Latin, Greek and Hebrew, so everyone could understand it.
It might seem like a tiny detail, but it is a dealbreaker.
All crucifixes have the INRI above Our Lord's head or else they're not a crucifix, even if claudel or anyone else says they are.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #52 on:** October 06, 2018, 02:09:08 PM »

Quote from: Matthew on October 06, 2018, 08:59:26 AM

I think this is why the Christ the King crucifix appeals to the neo-SSPX. They are high on themselves, high on pride, and they don't have in themselves the humility expressed by the classic Crucifix. They think they will save the Church, succeed where so many other groups failed, etc.

The Neo-SSPX is the group that built a huge, expensive, brand new seminary in Virginia to accommodate the influx of seminarians from the Indult and Novus Ordo. They are all about taking a high place.

...rather than humbly holding the True Faith inviolate, continuing to be called bad names by the World and various evil men and organizations, and letting God do the exalting on His own good time.

That's why they enlisted the expensive services of a corporate branding agency. Rather than patiently trust in God to send more people into the SSPX, or winning over new souls by their PRAYERS, spotless example, and timeless Catholic doctrine, they went hat-in-hand to the Jєωιѕн "human nature" experts on Madison Avenue to use psychology tricks and techniques on the Catholic population -- techniques normally used to sell soap or corn flakes.

You have to admit I'm right about this -- the SSPX is much more accepted now than they were in, say, the early 2000's. Almost no one calls them bad names anymore. Those names are reserved for the Resistance and other faithful Traditional Catholic groups here and there. Hmmm....

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Excellent post, Matthew!
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For the sake of 100% accuracy, however, I would recommend being more cautious with the word, by putting "crucifix" in italics or quotation marks. Any Christ the King cross that is missing the nails or INRI is NOT a "crucifix."
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Some are wont to say that it was the Romans who crucified Jesus, but according to Saint Paul, that's not the case.
St. Paul said it was the Jєωs who crucified Our Lord (I Thes. 2:15).
He ought to know, plus the fact that as "the Apostle" (according to St. Thomas Aquinas) he was personally infallible.
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The SSPX is much more acceptable now by the Jєωs than they were previously, thanks to Max Krah: a Jєω.

.

Where's Incredulous when you need him, anyway? ...............

.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #53 on:** October 06, 2018, 02:28:09 PM »

Quote from: Neil Obstat on October 06, 2018, 02:09:08 PM

.
Excellent post, Matthew!
.
For the sake of 100% accuracy, however, I would recommend being more cautious with the word, by putting "crucifix" in italics or quotation marks. Any Christ the King cross that is missing the nails or INRI is NOT a "crucifix."
.
Some are wont to say that it was the Romans who crucified Jesus, but according to Saint Paul, that's not the case.
St. Paul said it was the Jєωs who crucified Our Lord (cf. I Thes. 2:15).
He ought to know, plus the fact that as "the Apostle" (according to St. Thomas Aquinas) he was personally infallible.
.
The SSPX is much more acceptable now by the Jєωs than they were previously, thanks to Max Krah: a Jєω.
.
Where's Incredulous when you need him, anyway? ...............
.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #54 on:** October 06, 2018, 02:31:21 PM »

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There's a glitch going on. I did not make another post, above. I was only editing my previous post but my edit showed up as a second post! (trivia question: Can you see what the change was I inserted in the second version?)

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #55 on:** October 06, 2018, 02:42:27 PM »

Quote from: Pax Vobis on October 06, 2018, 09:28:21 AM

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Quote from: Matthew on October 06, 2018, 08:59:26 AM
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The Neo-SSPX is the group that built a huge, expensive, brand new seminary in Virginia to accommodate the influx of seminarians from the Indult and Novus Ordo. They are all about taking a high place.
.
...rather than humbly holding the True Faith inviolate, continuing to be called bad names by the World and various evil men and organizations, and letting God do the exalting on His own good time.
.
.
Agree. And how many comments have we heard recently about how some people don't like going to a hotel room for mass? Or they prefer a "nice" church over a rented conference room? I mean, is this mentality catholic? Isn't the Mass more important than where it's said? Sounds like some people have twisted materialistic-catholicism attitude or want a calvinist-rewarder-God religion. Explains why the sspx "looks down" on the resistance/independents - because they know most people care about image and self-respect than truth. Also explains why most will accept a deal with rome. So sad and short-sighted.
.

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Very true! I can't tell you how often I've heard Catholics complain about the folding chairs, kneeler pads on the floor, rented hall, mass-in-the-house or garage or warehouse, confessionals in a broom closet. People can be so caught up in material trappings.
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The SSPX is playing to the material sensibilities of people, which is a very soft target.
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I'm sure Max Krah and his Jєω-buddy branding experts have steered Menzingen in precisely that direction.

claudel · « **Reply #56 on:** October 06, 2018, 03:08:14 PM »

Quote from: Neil Obstat on October 06, 2018, 01:58:15 PM

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All crucifixes have the INRI above Our Lord's head or else they're not crucifix[es] …

Dear Boy Wonder,

Being what you are, a mouthy guy with little else to offer than mouth, you have been banging away for days with variants on the quoted sentence, usually with some form of highlighting to attract people who are susceptible to the charms of bright colors and carnival barkers. Notable by its absence from your insistent repetitions, however, has been any form of docuмentary support for your claim that the presence of an INRI plaque or scroll is a sine qua non of crucifix-ness.

Well, Neil, consider your play called: either back down or cite me chapter and verse of a canon or, at the least, a rubric for the Latin Rite Church that declares that a cross shall be called a crucifix if and only if both a corpus and an INRI scroll are present—that is, rather than the required presence of the corpus alone, which is the understanding in place among a mere 99.4 percent of Catholics.

If this sounds as if I am not prepared to take your word for it, you're absolutely right. Nor am I prepared to take the word of a priest you once chatted with in the parking lot after Mass on some Sunday in 2007. I want actual docuмentation. And don't forget to provide an effective date for your docuмentation. If this is some nineteenth-century regulation put in place to respond to some local abuse, I'll also want a reference to the order requiring every church in Christendom that displayed a crucifix without the INRI to start an immediate retrofit on pain of whatever.

So that's the story in its entirety. In the most fraternal spirit musterable, Neil, I am calling upon you to put up or shut up.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #57 on:** October 06, 2018, 03:14:19 PM »

Quote from: Ladislaus on October 05, 2018, 03:30:57 PM

Actually, his intent there was the condemnation of "antiquarianism", this notion that older always was better and more pure ... with the implicit idea that over time the purity of Church tradition became corrupted by the human accretion. This did not mean a rejection of the older at all. So, for instance, when he said that we should not reject polyphony, he was not thereby saying that it's better than Gregorian Chant. Same thing with images of the crucifixion. I agree that one is not inherently better than another. Unless some error can be detected as implied in the rendering, it's just a matter of taste and, for liturgical use, what has been approved the authority. I don't care for these myself, but I don't find anything wrong with them or inherently objectionable. Could they be seen as part of a broader slide into Modernist sensibilities? Yes, of course. And the reason these differ from Resurrectifixes I have already articulated. Our Lord was not on the cross after His Resurrection, but He can be viewed as being a King whose throne was the cross, that He reigns from the cross. I like the symbolism, but I don't like the regal trappings. I think that there's a reason that Our Lord chose to show Himself in so degrading a fashion, to demonstrate the humility of His rule vs. that of worldly monarchs, and to be stumbling-block for the pride ... as only the truly humble can recognize Him for Who He is amid the degradation.

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The fact that perhaps some very old and respectful and well-intentioned crosses (not crucifixes) may not have had INRI inscribed on them does not make them heretical or worse, considering their age. But just because their maker was trying to make a crucifix doesn't mean he succeeded.
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Just as dogma becomes more detailed and specific over the centuries after attacks by heresy, and so too, the Creed developed from the simple Apostles' Creed to the much more theologically complete (yet perhaps still not quite perfect!) Nicene Creed centuries later, what is a crucifix and what is not a crucifix has been more completely explained (yet perhaps still not quite perfectly!) after attacks on the Catholic Faith and the person of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
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Ancient artwork can be beautiful and inspirational and wonderful. At the same time we have to keep in mind how it is used.
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Something that was once quite effective might become inadequate after a history of attacks by the devil and his minions.
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You might have a cross that has been dear to your family for generations and at the center of wonderful conversions or even miraculous cures, but during an exorcism, the devil will revile the priest holding it if it doesn't have physical nails holding the corpus to the cross, or if the nails do not penetrate real wood to hold the corpus on. In that case, just being a crucifix is insufficient! It has to be a particular TYPE of crucifix!
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The late Fr. Gabriele Amorth was always known to use the St. Benedict Crucifix in his exorcisms, which has a semiprecious metallic frame with ebony wood inlays, through which brass nails penetrate both the semiprecious metallic corpus, the front wood inlay and the metal framework. The INRI is a semiprecious metallic formed emblem attached to the crucifix with another brass nail. He used that crucifix because it WORKS, when other crucifixes DON'T WORK.
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Traditional nuns only use real wood crucifixes with real nails through the wood on their handmade rosaries, and the St. Benedict crucifix is not uncommon.

Ladislaus · « **Reply #58 on:** October 06, 2018, 03:15:35 PM »

It takes a lack of faith not to realize that we receive and experience something greater than the entire created universe in Holy Communion. I go to receive God and not to see a building and some artwork.

Neil Obstat · « **Reply #59 on:** October 06, 2018, 03:17:20 PM »

Quote from: claudel on October 06, 2018, 03:08:14 PM

Dear Boy Wonder,

Being what you are, a mouthy guy with little else to offer than mouth, you have been banging away for days with variants on the quoted sentence, usually with some form of highlighting to attract people who are susceptible to the charms of bright colors and carnival barkers. Notable by its absence from your insistent repetitions, however, has been any form of docuмentary support for your claim that the presence of an INRI plaque or scroll is a sine qua non of crucifix-ness.

Well, Neil, consider your play called: either back down or cite me chapter and verse of a canon or, at the least, a rubric for the Latin Rite Church that declares that a cross shall be called a crucifix if and only if both a corpus and an INRI scroll are present—that is, rather than the required presence of the corpus alone, which is the understanding in place among a mere 99.4 percent of Catholics.

If this sounds as if I am not prepared to take your word for it, you're absolutely right. Nor am I prepared to take the word of a priest you once chatted with in the parking lot after Mass on some Sunday in 2007. I want actual docuмentation. And don't forget to provide an effective date for your docuмentation. If this is some nineteenth-century regulation put in place to respond to some local abuse, I'll also want a reference to the order requiring every church in Christendom that displayed a crucifix without the INRI to start an immediate retrofit on pain of whatever.

So that's the story in its entirety. In the most fraternal spirit musterable, Neil, I am calling upon you to put up or shut up.

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Do you have an emotional problem, claudel? Are you afraid of truth? Are you a cryptic Jєω infiltrator? Shut your incipient trap.

Author Topic: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary? (Read 9738 times)

claudel

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Ladislaus

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Ladislaus

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Prayerful

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Matthew

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Pax Vobis

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

claudel

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Ladislaus

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?

Neil Obstat

Re: What kind of crucifix is THAT at the SSPX seminary?