Tag: Pope John Paul II

“A Petition to the Canadian Bishops” [for the withdrawal of the Winnipeg Statement], December 2003. By Monsignor Vincent Foy

Preface

I sent  this letter to a number of bishops in Canada in December of 2003.  It was never published.

A Petition to the Canadian Bishops

“Contraception is to be judged objectively so profoundly unlawful, as never to be, for any reason, justified. To think or to say the contrary is equal to maintaining that in human life, situations may arise in which it is lawful not to recognize God as God”. (Pope John Paul II, quoted in L’Osservatore Romano, Oct.10, 1983),

Your Eminences, Your Graces, and Your Excellencies,

As you know, the contraceptive mentality pervades the Catholic Church in Canada. Most Catholic couples of child-bearing age are preventing children through sterilization or contraception. The birthrate is suicidal. The death of the Church is certain where contraception prevails. It has been truly said that “Our greatest moral responsibility is to convert the contraceptive mentality”.

Contraception is the root of which many spiritual evils are the fruit: abortion, infidelity, divorce, pre-marital sex, acceptance of homosexual activity, the clamor for same-sex “marriage” and the corruption of politics and the media. These inevitably follow when, on a large scale, sexual activity is deliberately diverted from its life-giving purpose to sterile lustful indulgence.

It must be acknowledged that in Canada the contraceptive mentality was fostered by the Winnipeg Statement of the Canadian bishops published on Sept. 28,1968. In that Statement Catholics were told that in some circumstances spouses “may be safely assured that, whoever chooses that course which seems right to him does so in good conscience”. This is against charity, justice and the truth. It is in contradiction to the constant teaching of the Church that contraception is an intrinsic evil permitting of no exceptions  (“Humanae Vitae”, n.14). Countless Catholics have referred to the Winnipeg Statement in justification of their contraceptive practice.

To restore in Canada the truth about life and love we ask that the Winnipeg Statement be revoked by you, our spiritual shepherds. We ask that all marriage  preparation courses, all catechetical texts and teaching, preaching, and confessional advice be in accordance with “Humanae Vitae”, given to us with the authority of Christ (H.V.,n.3).

Such action on the part of a national hierarchy would not be unprecedented. In 1990, the bishops of the Philippines issued a pastoral letter in which they apologized for their failure to promote the Church’s teaching on contraception. They said: “We abandoned you to your confused and lonely consciences with a lame excuse:  “follow what your conscience tells you”. How little did we realize that it was our consciences that  needed to be formed first”.

In the United States, the U.S. Conference of Bishops, in their November 2003 meeting, voted in favor of issuing a strong document explaining why contraception is wrong. It will be widely distributed in parish pamphlet racks and taught in high schools and colleges. Bishop Gregory, President of the American Bishops’ Conference said: “In many respects we haven’t spoken clearly enough, effectively enough, frequently enough. If anything, the actions we are taking today are very much needed and, many would say, even late”.

While the undersigned earnestly petition for the withdrawal of the Winnipeg Statement, we assure you, our bishops, of our constant prayers. May God bless you, the Holy Spirit guide you and Mary intercede for you in your apostolic mission.

The Moral Problems of Contraception; An in depth look at the fundamental problems of artificial contraception. By Monsignor Vincent Foy

Preface

Published as six short articles in Celebrate Life, 2002.  They were written on the invitation of Judie Brown, President of the American Life League and are a development of a short section in my booklet “From Humanae Vitae to Veritatis Splendor”.  The articles were later published in booklet form by St. Joseph’s Workers, 2002.

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The Moral Problems of Contraception:   An in depth look at the fundamental problems of artificial contraception

By Monsignor Vincent Foy

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“God has not called us to immorality, but to holiness”

(St. Paul to the Thessalonians)

Father John Hardon, S.J. (died Dec. 30, 2000) was surely one of the greatest theologians of the last century. Towards the end of his life, he gave a lecture entitled, “Our Greatest Moral Responsibility: to convert the Contraceptive Mentality.” There are great evils in the world today but it does not take much reflection to conclude that the greatest is the Contraceptive Mentality, parent of the Culture of Death.

The Contraceptive Mentality is anti-God, anti-Church, anti-society, anti-family, anti-spousal and anti-self. First we consider it in its most evil aspect as a revolt against God.

Contraception is Anti-God

The Church constantly reminds us that man is not the creator of human life but its procreator with God. The encyclical Humanae Vitae repeatedly reminds us of God’s overriding role. “Married persons are the free and responsible collaborators of God the Creator.” (n.1). Married persons “collaborate with God in the generation and education of new lives.” (n.8). The spouses “must conform their activity to the creative intention of God.” (n.10).  The magisterium teaches with the authority of Christ that there is an inseparable connection “willed by God and unable to be broken by man on his own initiative, between the two meanings of the conjugal act: the unitive meaning and the procreative meaning.” (n.12).

The primary evil of contraception is that it puts up a barrier against God’s creative will, a horrendous crime when seen in all its implications in time and eternity. It is therefore what is called a mortal sin; through denying a possible life to another the perpetrator kills his or her own soul. The contracepting person gravely violates the commandment of God “Thou shalt not kill.” In one sense contraception is worse than abortion. The aborted child will live forever in that degree of happiness which God’s mercy lovingly bestows. The contracepted child, if we can so speak of a child that will never be, but might have been a great saint, is sacrificed to the lust of should-have-been parents.

Also guilty of a grave offence against God are the cooperators in contraception. These are the purveyors of pills, condoms and devices that are anti-life and often abortifacient. Guilty also are bishops, pastors, confessors, theologians and counselors who lead others astray.

So grave are the offences against God’s co-creative will that St. Paul likens them to idolatry. He says: “Put to death whatever in your nature is rooted on earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desires; and that lust which is idolatry. These are the sins which provoke God’s wrath.” (Letter to the Colossians, 3).

We know from history that when sins against life become what we might call a critical mass, God’s anger does blaze forth. We have a striking example of this in the book of the prophet Jeremiah. He foretold the great evil that would come upon the Jewish people because of their idolatrous infanticide. He said: “The kings of Judah have filled the place with the blood of the innocent. They have built high places for Baal to immolate their sons in fire as holocausts to Baal.” What was God’s punishment? “All Judah I will deliver to the king of Babylon or slay them with the sword.” (cf. Jeremiah, 5). Is not contraception a willingness to offer children to the Baal of lust? In addition to other great evils, surely to be living in the dark and awful state of mortal sin is worse than banishment to Babylon.

Despite the gravity of their sin, those who have contracepted need not despair. Most urgently, in His love and mercy, God is calling them to repentance. As St. Jerome says: “Great mercy forgives great sins.” But there should be no delay.” Now is the acceptable time; now is the day of salvation.” All Catholics ought to pray for those spiritually dead because of contraception. All ought to wage spiritual war by prayer and penance against what we could call the unholy jihad of contraceptive practice.

Contraception is Anti-Church

The Church has been described as the continuation of the salvific mission of Christ to the world. Vatican II tells us that “The Church has the duty by divine mandate of going out into the whole world and preaching the Gospel to all men.” It also tells us that the whole Church is missionary and that the work of evangelization is a fundamental duty of the people of God. It adds: “Let all realize that their first and most important obligation toward the spread of the faith is this: to lead a profoundly Christian life.” (Decree on the Missionary Activity of the Church, n.30). The Saints are missionaries “par excellence.” If all Catholics led holy lives the whole world would soon be Catholic.

The great drag on the Church’s missionary activity is those Catholics whose sinful lives ignore the call to holiness. In the magnificent document “Evangelization in the Modern World” (Dec. 8, 1975) Pope Paul VI says: “The Lord wishes His Church to be universal. He willed that it should be a universal Church having no bounds or limits except those, alas, which are to be found in the minds and hearts of sinful men.” (n.61).

Today the greatest enemy of the Church’s missionary activity is not the world around her but the deep internal wound of the contraceptive mentality. This wound impedes the Church’s mission in many ways.

Unity in teaching the truth, including the teaching of the Gospel of Life, is essential to evangelization. Tragically, that unity does not exist. After the publication of the encyclical Humanae Vitae in 1968, twelve national Conferences of Bishops so distorted the teaching of the encyclical as to virtually destroy it. Among the worst statements were those of the Bishops of Belgium, the Netherlands, West Germany and Canada.

Illustrative of the worst is the so-called Winnipeg Statement of the Canadian Bishops of Sept. 27, 1968. In paragraph 26 of that Statement they said that in some circumstances the spouses “may be safely assured that whoever follows that course which seems right to him does so in good conscience.” Of this John F. Kippley says: “A more misleading statement would be hard to imagine. There are no principles of moral theology that allow a person to engage in actions taught by the Church to be objectively immoral, whether such actions be adultery, contraception, fornication, or sodomy. And, of course what applies to one behavior applies to all.” (Sex and the Marriage Covenant, The Couple to Couple league, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1991, p. 145).

Added to the teaching of some hierarchies was that of dissenting theologians and these have been in the hundreds, including brilliant but mistaken men like Karl Rahner and Bernard Lonergan. Others are Hans Kung, Andrew Greeley, Charles Davis, Edward Schillebeeckx and Richard McCormick. So we have what could be called optional, regional or national morality, supported by many so-called Catholic newspapers and periodicals. This dissent, spread like anthrax spores, has stricken the Church’s Mystical Body and gravely compromised her saving apostolate.

Those who contracept are spiritually dead, objectively unfitted for the reception of Holy Communion and supernatural merit. They are far from giving the example of a Christian life.  Given that the majority of spouses of childbearing age in Europe, the U.S., Canada and other countries are contracepting, one can see how grave is this block to the Church’s Christ-given mission of converting the world.

Widespread contraception, with suicidal birthrates, leaves the Church without adequate vocations to the priesthood, religious life, and missionary work. Religious vocations and a faithful dedicated laity come generally from families faithful to the Church.

The contraceptive mentality reduces the Church’s ability to withstand assault from without. The more Catholics are reduced in relative numbers and in those giving exemplary example, the more likely are they to be oppressed. Catholics become victims of a secularized press and other media, discriminated against by civil laws and unable to effectively respond.

The principal means of overcoming the contraceptive mentality is prayer, for and by those who are contracepting. Pope John Paul II said: “Prayer is the basic prerequisite to save the Church.” That prayer must be humble, of sinners for sinners. The book of Sirach reminds us that “The prayer of the humble pierces the clouds.” Out of prayer will come the grace to support those efforts and groups fighting bravely on behalf of Life. The Church our Mother, through whom we are born into grace and have the hope of salvation, is in peril. Do we have the Faith and love to help her? May we pray with the breviary oration: “Father, help us to work generously for the salvation of the world so that Thy Church may bring us and all mankind into Thy presence. Grant this through Christ our Lord.”

Contraception is Anti-society

We are social creatures. We live and move in what is called the social order. It exists to promote justice and order and peace.

Fundamental to a just social order is respect for human life. Pope John Paul II expressed it this way on February 14, 2001: “The promotion of the Culture of Life should be the highest priority of our societies…If the right to life is not defended decisively as a condition for all other rights of the person, all other references to human rights remain deceitful and illusory.”

Fostering the Culture of Life does not only mean respect for life from conception until natural death. It means also repudiation of contraception, the root cause of all other attacks on human life. Contraception, which shows a willingness to sacrifice life to lust, is a fuse which ignites a whole chain of evils destructive of a just society, from abortion to euthanasia.

Worse than the ten plagues which devastated Egypt in the time of Moses, the contraceptive mentality is a multi-pronged attack on society. It tends to permeate more and more social structures and even creates its own institutions.

The most powerful and influential structure of the moral order is government. In his encyclical Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI warned us that the contraceptive mentality would place a dangerous weapon in the hands of public authorities. He said: “Who will stop rulers from favoring, from even imposing upon their people, if they were to consider it necessary, the method of contraception which they judge to be most efficacious?” (n.17). In vain did he appeal to rulers when he said: “Do not allow the morality of your people to be degraded; do not permit that by legal means practices contrary to the natural and divine law be introduced into the fundamental cell, the family” (Ibid., n.23). In general, governments have turned a deaf ear to that urgent plea.

Many non-governmental institutions (called NGOs) spread the contraceptive virus. Most influential of these is the United Nations. Driven by a tyrannical secularism, it has tied help to poorer countries to the support of programs of contraception, abortion, sterilization and acceptance of homosexual and lesbian unions. Other organizations with similar agendas and supporting the U.N. are International Planned Parenthood, the Population Council which is sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Women’s Environment and Development Organization and the Worldwatch Institute.

The contraceptive mentality diminishes the level of love in society and increases the level of selfishness and lust. In education, it promotes sex-education and the resultant corruption of the young. In hospital care it leads to sterilization, abortion, and euthanasia. In the media, it tends toward license, vulgarity, pornography, and increases hostility towards God and religion.

Not least of the self-inflicted wounds caused by the contraceptive mentality is the high economic price. There is the high price tag for contraception, abortion, AIDS, other sexually transmitted diseases and family break-ups. There is the high cost of age imbalance, with heavier and heavier burdens placed on the young, who must care for their contracepting elders. It is estimated that by the year 2050, one third of the people in Western countries will be over sixty. Social security systems and pension plans will be inadequate and the standard of living drastically reduced.

One does not have to be an Isaiah or Jeremiah to predict that, if the contraceptive mentality continues to prevail, our society is headed for disaster. If one needs convincing, one may read such books as The Demographic Crisis by Michael Schooyans (Central Bureau, St. Louis) or Death of the West by Pat Buchanan. With statistical proofs it is shown that, if the present course is continued, by the year 2050 the US will be a Third World nation. A similar fate awaits Europe. In a chapter entitled “Where have all the children gone?” Pat Buchanan tells us why it is unlikely that the West can solve the demographic crisis before it leads to “The Death of the West.”

It is only by a miracle of grace and mercy that the contraceptive mentality can be turned into one of love and life. The hour is late; a dark night of the social order approaches. We need to be heroic in our support of pro-life causes. We need to recognize that contraception is the new terrorism. In greater and greater numbers we need to March for Life. We need to pray and do penance, pray and do penance, pray and do penance. May God help us and may Our Blessed Mother intercede for us.

Contraception is Anti-Family

Reflecting on the marriage covenant, Pope John Paul II says: “The communion of love between God and His people, a fundamental part of the revelation and faith experience of Israel, finds a meaningful expression in the marriage covenant which is established between a man and woman – their bond of love becomes the image and symbol of the covenant uniting God with His people.” (Familiaris Consortio, n.12).

Contraception makes a lie of the marriage covenant. There is no longer total self-giving in the marriage act. It no longer symbolizes the union of God with His people or Christ with His Church. It is a broken, defaced mockery of that union. Contraception replaces self-giving love with the hate of marital abuse. Because it is a species of infidelity within the marriage, it makes infidelity outside the marriage more likely. In truth, it makes spouses enemies of one another, cooperators in each other’s’ spiritual ruin. When the marriage is entered into with the intention to exclude the right to children, that union is null and void.

Even when the spouses are in good faith, the subconscious dynamisms of the contraceptive mentality are gnawing away at their union. Contraception always divides, never unites. The repelling effect of this unnatural procedure is like a centrifugal force which alienates one from the other.

When contraceptives are also abortifacients, as in most cases, the family home becomes a killing ground. Human persons, made in God’s image, are conceived and sent to sewer tombs without the chance to answer God’s call to holiness. It is a direct confrontation with God’s loving co-creating will.

The deliberately childless marriage has anti-family effects of immense proportions, for children are often the bond that cements the parents’ love. An illicitly diminished family also suffers. The children who are born, sometimes unwanted, are love-deprived. They are also deprived of brothers and sisters who should have been but are not. They cannot but be affected by the example of hedonistic parents and a home in which true marital harmony cannot exist.

Added to all this is the high rate of marital breakdown which must be attributed to contraceptive practice. Oral contraceptives were introduced in 1960. According to Princeton University historian Lawrence Stone, “The scale of marital breakdown in the West since 1960 has no historical precedent that I know of and seems unique.” (Detroit Free Press, May 11, 2000).

In sum, the contraceptive attack on the family is a tragedy of horrendous proportions. Only supernatural means can stop it. Are we willing to pray and sacrifice enough?

Contraception is Anti-Spousal

The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us that marriage is “by its very nature ordered to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring.” (n.1601). Since it is ordered to the good of the spouses it can and should be a means to help them pursue together their glorious call to holiness.

That one spouse ought to be the support of the other derives from the nature and closeness of their union. The two have become one flesh, a symbol of the fruitful union of Christ and His Church. The closeness of the marital union is described by St. Francis de Sales: “God joins the husband to the wife with His own blood: and therefore the union is so strong that the soul ought rather to be separated from the body of the one and of the other, than the husband from the wife.” This emphasizes how tragic is that conduct by which one party would lead the other away from goodness and grace.

The mutual help which is an end or purpose of marriage is destroyed by contraception. Contraception degrades married love, defaces it beyond recognition, transforms it more radically than was Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde. It makes the spouses deadly spiritual enemies of one another. It turns love into hate and does this in manifold ways.

Because contraception is a mortal sin, destroying grace in the soul, consent to it means consent of one spouse to the eternal damnation of the other. It is a frightful betrayal to cooperate in the exchange of the gold of grace for the dross of lust.

By contraception one spouse is willing to unfit the other for the reception of Holy Communion, or for any supernatural merit.

By contraception one spouse is willing to deny to the other all the great goods which might otherwise come from children and parenting.

When one party persuades the other to contracept, there is an act of seduction. When one objects, but submits under pressure, there is a violation of conscience and person, which is akin to marital rape. When the contraceptive means are known to be abortifacient, as with the birth-control pill and intrauterine devices, both become murderers by intent.

Finally, if one enters marriage intending to deny to the other the right to that act which of its nature leads to procreation, the union is null and void. The marriage acts become acts of fornication.

Perhaps now we see how important it is for spouses to reject the evil of contraception. In the words of St. Augustine, we are living in the land of the dying, but this land of the dying is God’s way of leading us to the land of eternal life. We ought to pray for those who are contracepting. God’s mercy calls them to repentance, restoration to peace, grace, true love, and then to eternal life.

Contraception is Anti-Self

By our nature we have an inescapable love of ourselves. But because God is love and we are conceived in and for love, God has decreed that true love of self cannot exist without love of others. So we have the paradox that the more we love God and others, to that degree do we truly love ourselves.

Christ tells us, that: “Great love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13). This gives us some insight into the abysmal lack of love in the act of contraception. It so far departs from a willingness to give one’s life for another as to be willing to sacrifice a life for one’s selfish lust. It violates the great commandment of love of others and the sixth commandment of God. (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, n.2376). Spiritually, contraception is profoundly anti-self, inflicting upon oneself the ultimate wound, that abuse of freedom which is called mortal sin. Unrepented, that sin is a bar to eternal life.

Aside from guilt and motivation, contraception has its own intrinsic negative dynamics. It is a selfish act, creating a selfish person; a lustful act, creating a lustful person; an exploitative act, creating an exploiting person. It usually becomes a habit, blinding the mind and weakening the will as few other sins do. It is not surprising that many contracepting Catholics abandon the practice of their Faith or lose their Faith. Many abandon the Sacrament of Penance and add sacrilege to sin by receiving Holy Communion.

When considering the anti-self effect of contraception we must keep in mind that we are not only referring to the immediate user of contraception. Also guilty are all formal cooperators who promote or condone contraception, whether confessors, counselors, teachers, doctors, nurses, or others. These also are self-destroyers.

So concludes our brief discussion of the evil of contraception. It is anti-God, anti-Church, anti-society, anti-family, anti-spousal, and anti-self. When one considers this evil in all its sociological and theological aspects and its gross attack on the Culture of Life, its defense and promotion become a mystery of perversity.

While contraception threatens to bury multitudinous souls in its shroud of hate and death, there remains hope. God knocks at the door of every soul. In His mercy He hears the prayers not only of the innocent but of the penitent. God does not want the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live. The juggernaut of contraception can be stopped by prayer, sacrifice, and the Sacraments. These means have been described by Pope John Paul II as the most powerful in human history. Will enough of us use them?

The Evil of Liturgical Abuse

By Msgr. Vincent Foy

Published in Challenge Magazine, 1997 and The Roman Catholic Faithful Newsletter, December, 1997.               

“The liturgy has its laws which must be respected.”

Pope John Paul II, March 8, 1997

A liturgical crisis has been brewing for a long time. Back in 1973, Archbishop Robert Dwyer of Portland Oregon, wrote: “Sincere Christian men and women in their thousands and millions are reacting against the impoverishment and degradation of the liturgy, as they are reacting against so many displays of enfeebled or uncertain leadership.” (Catholic Priests’ Association Bulletin [England]. Vol. I and II, 1973, p.42). Since then, the crisis has deepened. Abuses are pandemic.

The Instruction “Inaestimabile Donum” (Inestimable Gift”) of April 3, 1980, lists some of the liturgical aberrations reported from different parts of the Catholic world. Among them are “the confusion of roles, especially regarding the priestly ministry and the role of the laity (indiscriminate shared recitation of the Eucharistic Prayers homilies given by lay people, lay people distributing Holy Communion while the priests refrain from doing so); an increasing loss of the sense of the sacred (abandonment of liturgical vestments, the Eucharist celebrated outside Church without real need, lack of reverence and respect for the Blessed Sacrament, etc.); misunderstanding of the ecclesial nature of the liturgy (the use of private texts, the proliferation of unapproved Eucharistic Prayers, the manipulation of the liturgical texts for social and political ends).”

The list of other abuses is long: there is a refusal to give Holy Communion on the tongue, or to those who are kneeling; bowing instead of genuflecting after the elevation; holding hands during the Our Father; unwarranted so-called liturgical dancing; leaving the sanctuary to give the kiss of peace; changing, adding or omitting words even during the Canon of the Mass. One should not dismiss such aberrations as minor. “The relative seriousness of a given rubric should not be our primary concern; our primary concern should be that any deviation from the rule of prayer diminishes the legacy of unity which Christ on the eve of His death asked his Father to bestow on His Church.” (Msgr. Clarence 1. Hettinger, Homiletic and Pastoral Review, Feb. 1997, p 57).

Among other liturgical horrors are clown masses, rock masses, and the profanation of the church as a sacred place by the pagan “Missa Gaia.” There is the annual “Call to Action” mass attended by bishops, priests, religious and laity, at which all say the words of consecration. Several years ago, at the “Call to Action” convention in Detroit, Dianne Neu spoke of “Creating Feminist Liturgies.” She said: “Feminist liturgy brings to public expression the faith life of the community, free from hierarchy, patriarchy, curiarchy…I think it is important for us to have the edge that we are moving away from the kind of a Church that can excommunicate us.” (cf. Human Life International Report, No. 151, July, 1997).

A fairly recent atrocity is the “Tyme Mass” in London, England, during which the young danced in a night-club atmosphere, a young woman gave the homily and sesame-seed loaves were consecrated in ceramic bowls. This experiment had the approval of Cardinal Hume as “a means of attracting young people back to the Church.” (cf. Christian Order, May, 1997, pp. 262-269).

A current common practice destructive of faith and morals is the reception by all, or nearly all, of the Holy Communion. This is at a time when sexual sins are rampant and our confessionals are deserted. Many have been led to erroneously believe that the Mass forgives mortal sins. The teaching of the Church is that the Mass “is an antidote by which we are freed from daily faults and are preserved from mortal sins” (Council of Trent, Session 13. C. 2). St. Paul says: “whoever eats the bread and drinks the cup in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the Body and Blood of the Lord.” (1 Cor., 11:27). We have a witness to ancient Tradition in the document “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.” It reads: “The statement of the Lord applies here also: ‘Do not give to dogs what is holy’…Oh the Lord’s day, when you have been gathered, break bread and celebrate the Eucharist. But first confess your sins so that your offering may be pure.” (Second reading of the 14th week in Ordinary Time, the Roman. Breviary.) See also the Code of Canon Law, C. 916.

Perhaps there never was a time when our sanctuaries were so dishonoured by breaches of liturgical law. In his recent autobiography, Cardinal Ratzinger attributes the present Church crisis to liturgical collapse.

The importance of the liturgy, the public worship of the Church, can hardly be exaggerated. The work of the liturgy is our sanctification and salvation. Through it we go from sin to grace, from earth to Heaven. The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy of Vatican II tells us: “it is the liturgy through which, especially in the divine Sacrifice of the Eucharist, the work of our redemption is accomplished.” (Introduction, n. 2). No private action is comparable to liturgical worship: “Every liturgical celebration, because it is an action of Christ the Priest and of His Body, which is the Church, is a sacred action surpassing all others.” (ibid. n. 7).

Among all the forms of prayer, liturgical prayer is pre-eminent. “There is nothing better here below than prayer, and the best prayer is evidently that of the Church, since it is the ineffable prayer of Christ, continued and always active.” (Pierre Charles, S.J., “Prayer for All Times,” London, Sands, and Co., 1929, Vol. II, p. 48).

Not only does the liturgy offer grace and salvation, it is also a vehicle of divine revelation, a preserver and teacher of doctrine, the ultimate Catechist, instructing and teaching on matters of faith. “Lex orandi, lex credendi,” the law of prayer or worship is also the law or carrier of our belief. Pope Pius XII referred to the liturgy as “the principal organ of the Magisterium of the Church” (quoted from ‘Spiritual Theology,’ Jordan Aumann, a.p., Sheed and VVard, London, 1986, p.29).

The measure of charity in the world can be largely gauged by the measure of liturgical worship. “Let there be no illusion. There is no charity possible as an institution, as a thing that is a world-power, outside the sacrament of Christ’s Mystical Body.” (Dom Anscar Vonier, “A Key to the Doctrine of the Eucharist,” Newman Press, 1975, p. 257). Pope John Paul II has affirmed the essential link between the Eucharist and the Church’s spiritual and apostolic vitality. (Dominicae Cenae, Feb. 24, 1980, no. 4).

The Liturgy and Law

Because the liturgy is so important, the Church guards it and protects it with liturgical law. She does this with divinely delegated authority. “Regulation of the sacred liturgy depends solely on the authority of the Church, that is, on the Apostolic See and, as laws may determine, the bishop.” (Vatican IL Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, n. 22). Bishops and bishops’ conferences have only that authority over the liturgy which is explicitly granted. “No other person, not even a priest, may add, renew or change anything in the liturgy on his own authority.” (ibid.). The reason for this is that “liturgical services pertain to the whole Body of the Church… they manifest it and have effects upon it.” (ibid. n. 26).

Liturgical law is found in numerous instruments. The Code of Canon Law is not a primary source. It says “For the most part, the Code does not determine the rites to be observed in the celebration of liturgical actions.” (c. 2). It does contain some liturgical law and legislates what is of central importance to this article: “The liturgical works, approved by the competent authority, are to be faithfully followed in the celebration of the Sacraments. Accordingly, no one may on a personal initiative add to or omit or alter anything in those books.” (C. 846.1).

The main corpus of liturgical law is scattered over literally dozens of Instructions, Declarations, Apostolic Letters, Notes and other documents. There is the Constitution of Vatican II on the Sacred Liturgy and three Instructions on the Correct Implementation of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. There is the General Instruction of the Roman Missal. Liturgical books like the Lectionary, the breviary and the Rites of the Sacraments, all contain their specific laws. The Church regulates Indulgences through her Enchiridion. She approves blessings and constitutes sacramentals by which she dispenses spiritual benefits from her inexhaustible treasury of grace.

All liturgical law is ordained not to unduly restrict freedom of worship, but to enhance it, to ensure both the truth and beauty of public prayer. There is a marvellously concise overview of liturgical doctrine and law in “The Catechism of the Catholic Church,” paragraphs 1066-1209. It answers the questions: Why the Liturgy? Who Celebrates the Liturgy? How is the Liturgy Celebrated? When is the Liturgy Celebrated? Where is the Liturgy Celebrated?

The Intrinsic Evil of Liturgical Abuse

Liturgical aberrations are nothing less than a falsification of worship. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “One who offers worship to God on the Church’s behalf in a way contrary to that which is laid down by the Church with God-given authority…is guilty of falsification.” (Summa Theologica, 2-2, q. 93, a. 1). The falsification consists in pretending to act in the name of Christ and His Church when one is acting on one’s own. It is a violation of the first commandment. The priest becomes impostor.

Liturgical abuses are a form of Pelagian pride. The abuser acts as though the action of Christ and the Church are not enough. He must supplement it, subtract from it or modify it to enhance its redemptive work. He sets up his own priesthood in opposition to Christ’s.

Abuses are also a form of liturgical nihilism. Humility of worship is replaced by pride, service by disobedience. Scandal replaces edification and the custodian becomes destroyer. What should be a source of grace becomes an occasion of sin; what should be an act of divine love becomes a profound breach of charity. In liturgical nihilism, the abuse is emptied of Christ. In the words of Pope Paul VI, “Anything that departs from this pattern (of loyalty to the will of the Church as expressed in its precepts, norms and structures), even if it has a specious attractiveness, is in fact spiritually upsetting to the faithful, and makes the ministry of priests lifeless and sterile.” (Directory on Masses for Special Groups.)

The Effects of Liturgical Abuses

No good results can come from liturgical abuses. The Instruction, “lnaestimabile Donum” points out four principal effects:

1. The unity of faith and worship is impaired. The Church has always taken care to see that worship and prayer are in harmony with true doctrine. Credal truths are the golden threads holding together the whole liturgical fabric. The axiom ‘the law of prayer is the law of belief is found in a fifth-century document and is doubtless witness to apostolic tradition.

Liturgical abuses often inculcate doctrinal errors along with their deviation from the rubrics. The practice in some churches of saying “all are invited to the table” teaches either that the Mass forgives moral sins or that the state of grace is not necessary for the reception of Holy Communion. The heresy is sometimes taught that without the assembly there is no Eucharist.

Iconoclasm in our churches has diminished devotion to our Blessed Mother and the saints. The Church teaches that “Sacred images in our churches and homes are intended to awaken and nourish our faith in the mystery of Christ. Through the icon of Christ and His work of salvation, it is He Whom we adore. Through sacred images of the Holy Mother of God, of the angels and of the saints, we venerate the persons represented.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1193). In some churches, sacred statues have been destroyed, replaced by images of non-saints or worse. The Buffalo church of St. Ambrose has windows depicting the goddess Shiva and Teilhard de Chardin. (cf. “Church Renovations Embody Cluster of Heretical Notions, “by Paul Likoudis, the Wanderer, July 24, 1997, p. 1).

2. Abuses bring with them doctrinal uncertainty. When through abuses Christ is ignored in the Eucharist, surely this tends to bring His presence into doubt. This is done in myriad ways. Sometimes the tabernacle is so hidden that the words of Mary Magdalene could apply: “They have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him.” (John 20, 13). Christ is ignored through the failure to genuflect when the rubrics demand it, by standing during the Consecration, by failure to make a sign of adoration in receiving Holy Communion. Christ is ignored by loud or idle talk or socializing in church. To ignore a person is to treat him or her as nothing. To ignore Christ on the altar or in the tabernacle is to treat Him as non-existent. So, the ground is laid for doctrinal errors like transignification and transfinalization in place of the truth of transubstantiation. One sees how Luther and Calvin were able to destroy the Mass by presenting it as a celebration instead of Sacrifice, as The Lord’s Supper instead of the act of our salvation through the mystical death of Christ on our altars.

When reverence, decorum, recollection and rightful awe disappear from our churches, more worthy of respect than the Holy of Holies of the Old Testament, the church becomes a place of diminished faith. In the introductory rite for the Dedication of a Church, we read: “This is a place of awe; this is God’s house, the gate of Heaven, and it shall be called the royal court of God.” We ought to conduct ourselves accordingly.

3. Liturgical abuses cause scandal and bewilderment among the People of God. Priests and people are often deeply offended when they see liturgical violations. I know an older priest who has spent his priestly life on the missions. When he returns on his annual visit to his Mother House, he is scandalized to see his confreres celebrating the community Mass without alb or chasuble. An associate pastor who trained altar boys to genuflect before the Blessed Sacrament heard the pastor forbid the boys to do so because it was “pre-Vatican II.” Pastors are scandalized by associates who violate the liturgy and vice-versa, causing trouble or tension in the rectory. One couple I met at the “Call to Holiness” convention in Detroit last year told me they drive over 50 miles to Mass every Sunday. At their own church, the priest invited all to say the words of the Consecration because, he told them, “You are Church.”

Examples of such offences could be listed in the tens of thousands. They are a grave injustice and merit grave concern. They are, and should be, shocking. Anne Roche Muggeridge once invited a non-Catholic friend to Mass in Ireland where she thought the liturgy would be save from the despoilers. She reported that she was embarrassed: “It was like taking someone home to meet your mother and having her get drunk and dance on the table.”

4. Liturgical abuses bring “a near inevitability of violent reaction.” Some are bewildered and grieve in silence. In many, the reaction is bitter criticism, anger, resentment or a deep feeling of betrayal. Some stop going to Mass. Some so criticize the Church that their children lose respect for the religion of their parents and are alienated from the faith. Every liturgical aberration sets up its own chain of negative reactions by a kind of tragic Newtonian law.

The Remedies

Obviously, liturgical abuses are eliminated through the observance of liturgical law. This remedy is the vindication of a right. Canon 214 of the Code of Canon Law says that “Christ’s faithful have the right to worship God according to the provisions of their own rite approved by the lawful Pastors of the Church.”

The law states clearly where the responsibility lies. In his own diocese, the correction of liturgical abuses is the obligation of the bishop (cf. C.392.2). Under the bishop’s authority, the parish priest must direct the liturgy in his own parish, and he is bound to “be on guard against abuses.” (C. 528.2).

To obtain the correction of an abuse, it should be sufficient to draw the attention of the parish priest to an aberration. If this is insufficient, it should be enough to bring the matter to the attention of the bishop. In short, if Church law and legal redress were observed, there would not be a liturgical abuse in the world.

In the present liturgical crisis, when rubrical anarchy is rampant, it is obvious that law and recourse are often ignored or rebuffed. “There will be no witch-hunting in this diocese,” said one bishop when it was reported to him that many parishes permitted altar girls before they were allowed.

What then is the remedy? When shepherds will not shepherd, the remedy, an inadequate one, must be found in one’s personal reaction. Some bear with abuses as a cross and penance. Others legitimately go to another parish or to a church of another rite or a Tridentine Mass. The options licitly available are expertly discussed by Fr. John Hardon, S.J., in a tape entitled “How to Cope with Abuses in the Eucharistic Liturgy” (Eternal Life, P.O. Box 787, Bardstown, KY, 40004, U.S.A.)

The tragedy is that some, in anguish and rebellion, stop going to church and join the literally millions worldwide who have lost their faith in this generation. Not all the responsibility is theirs.

All Catholics have some obligation to right the liturgical wrong. All can pray for their bishops and priests.

Some can join or support societies or movements which advocate right liturgy. Seeing no evil when it is there is the way to further liturgical decay.

Liturgical Abuses and Empty Churches

Liturgical abuses are a form of Liberal Catholicism, the great enemy of the Church today. It is a reincarnation of Modernism. St. Pius X spoke of “the perfidious plot of liberal Catholics.” Of liberal Catholics today, Mother Angelica said recently: “Everything God doesn’t want is on their agenda.” In the moral order, liberal Catholics call for freedom from sexual restraint, the right to premarital sex, contraception, divorce, homosexual practice, even abortion. In the liturgical order, it takes the form of freedom from rubrical law.

Liturgical abuses, like all liberal Catholicism, are a rejection of divinely constituted authority. As Cardinal Newman said, authority is the very essence of our revealed religion, coming through Christ to St. Peter and his successors to us. Liturgy is so bound up with authority and the apostolic hierarchy established by Christ that without it “there would be no public worship as Catholicism understands the liturgy.” (Fr. John Hardon, S.J., “The Catholic Catechism,” Doubleday and Co., p. 450). When the sanctuary becomes a site of rebellion against the Church’s authority, the action of Christ as High Priest is diminished or disappears. Empty churches are certain to follow. There echoes in our ears the chant of Psalm 74 concerning the Temple of Jerusalem: “The enemy has laid waste the whole of the sanctuary … they have razed and profaned the place where You dwell.”

May we pray often and fervently for the preservation and restoration of the Church’s liturgy, “the Sacrament of our Salvation.”

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