The Freedom To Be Catholic
By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
News of my parish’s imminent demise in the wake of the death-dealing Traditionis custodes has spread through the Internet and at least one Catholic video news source of the independent sort. Many of the so-called “official” sources like to pretend we don’t exist.
One news outlet used a video of mine about a transgender children’s story hour a few years back and didn’t bother to credit me by name. That’s how much some forces in the Church like to avoid the uncomfortable truth that we exist.
They’re all noticing us now. A prominent priest associated with directing the plans for providing the TLM at three new locations in the archdiocese admitted that “most” of the people attending the new authorized southern Maryland TLM will be coming from my parish. So far no word on how they will continue financial support of my parish after they are no longer attending weekly Sunday Mass here.
Yes, for some the truth that we exist may be uncomfortable, but exist we soon may no longer. Our viability is jeopardized in the wake of new restrictions by the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., stripping our parish of the Traditional Latin Mass.
After the edict goes into effect on September 21, we will be down to 20 or 30 people at one Sunday Mass who give $400-600 per week. That for a budget as high as $15,000 a month.
“Catholic” is not about thought control. It is not about avoiding uncomfortable truths. No: It is about freedom. “For freedom Christ has set us free.” Freedom of thought, freedom of action for the Lord who is Truth is the identifying characteristic of a Catholic. Even the world recognizes this long after some self-professed Catholics have forgotten it.
Why else do pro-aborts Pelosi and Biden receive Holy Communion while on camera at Mass, as Satanists and pro-abortion terrorists attack and burn churches, desecrating tabernacles and the Blessed Sacrament, the Real Presence of Truth Himself? Even those who are evil still recognize that the Church teaches the truth about the sacredness of human life in the womb.
No, “Catholic” is not about “comfort.” Quite the opposite. It is about the Cross. In these days of episcopal persecution my preaching about the Cross and the love of the Lord who invites us to share in His martyrdom has never been more relevant or compelling. The apostles considered themselves blessed for having been found worthy of suffering “for the sake of the Name” of the Lord Jesus. We should, of course, do no less.
There is one tradition upon which we can and surely will depend: persecution of the faith in every age has resulted in a new flowering of it. “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”
Bishops are custodians first of souls, and of traditions only after that for the sake of souls. “Custodians of tradition,” the name of Pope Francis’ document targeting Catholics who prefer the TLM, sounds more like antique restorers employed by a museum. I’m pretty sure the Pope would insist he doesn’t see himself as such.
I’d like to see the Holy Father, with his immense compassion for people, publish something called Custodes animae. I won’t hold my breath, however. The Church exists for the salvation of souls. Traditions in the Church exist for the sake of the care of souls. Take those away and the Church becomes irrelevant, the very museum piece which the Pope often decries.
Benedict XVI breathed the freedom of the Spirit back into the Church with Summorum Pontificum, the most significant papal initiative since Vatican II. Finally, a Pope decided to take a break from the stream of seemingly endless papal documents spinning Vatican II, and suggested we just do what the Church has always done. In other words, an “experiment” with Tradition, as suggested by one holy archbishop in the period after Vatican II when the Church was drowning spiritually among experiments with everything else but.
The papacy and the episcopacy are not experiments. They are of divine origin, revealed and instituted by Our Lord Himself. We who love Tradition do not pick and choose: We accept and hold these and all that is thus handed down. That is why traditions are Catholic, and the Catholic faith is tradition.
The Pope doesn’t seem to want traditional Catholics in his parishes any more. We, however, need the Pope, whether he thinks he needs us or not. We need him, and our bishop, because we are Catholic in the traditional sense. We revere and honor Christ and all He ordained for the Church and her life.
Phil Lawler in “The Backward Logic of Traditionis Custodes,” writes:
“Insofar as Traditionis Custodes provides any explanation for its open hostility toward Catholic traditionalists, that explanation lies in the claim that traditionalist communities have caused divisions within the Church. Therefore, Pope Francis suggests (and the Congregation for Divine Worship even more sternly insists) traditionalism must be suppressed.
“That logic is backward. It was not the traditionalist movement — much less the Traditional liturgy — that exacerbated divisions within Catholicism. It was the current Vatican leadership — the very leadership that is now looking for a scapegoat to blame.”
Those who pull their finger from the dam, in a continual revolution for the new, sweep themselves away with everyone else in the ensuing flood. This is the existential danger that Pope Francis risks as he pulls away one stone after another.
Undermining the Church beginning with her traditions is neither the “spirit” nor the letter of Vatican II. To presume the fathers of Vatican II would bless a denial of the will of Christ for our salvation is the height of absurdity.
What is most contradictory about Pope Francis is that his attacks on tradition, “restorationists” and “backwardism,” are an attack upon the very foundation on which he and his words stand. As with a keystone, take it away and the whole edifice falls.
Thus are the elements of tradition carefully constructed, interdependently and rationally interwoven through trial and error, truth versus falsehood, over millennia.
The freedom to be Catholic is freedom for all the truth: “I give you the Holy Spirit to lead you into all the truth.” That is the work of the Holy Spirit in every age. Take that away and the Church becomes either an oppressor or an “altar boy” to those who oppress. More ominous still, the Lord teaches that the only unforgivable sin is that against the Holy Spirit.
Thank you for reading and praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever.
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