Vatican Document Seeks to Correct Vatican Liturgical Abuses

by Christopher A. Ferrara

        Serious students of the Fatima apparitions are less than persuaded by the Vatican’s June 26, 2000 disclosure of a vision pertaining to the Third Secret of Fatima. The allegorical content of the vision is unexplained by words of the Virgin, Whose words are yet to be published. Those words almost certainly follow the telltale phrase "In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved etc." In light of the contents of the Third Secret, Sister Lucy has remarked many times on the "diabolical disorientation" of the human element of the Church since 1960 — the year the Third Secret was supposed to be revealed in its entirety.

        Nowhere is this diabolical disorientation more apparent than in the destruction of the Church’s traditional Latin liturgy in favor of bizarre innovations so shocking the sight of them would have stopped the hearts of the pre-conciliar popes. Putting aside the replacement of the traditional Latin Mass with the Mass of Paul VI, one need only point to the innovations of the past 25 years during the pontificate of John Paul II: altar girls, liturgical dancing, the proliferation of pestiferous "eucharistic ministers" and the universal administration of communion in the hand, including by the Pope himself at papal Masses.

        In recent days rumors have surfaced concerning a draft Vatican document that will supposedly call for an end to the abuses which have dramatically corrupted even the Mass of Paul VI over the past quarter century. On September 23, CWNews.com reported that there is an intense internal struggle within the Roman Curia over this document, which the liberals are calling "too conservative." CWN notes that "The daily newspaper Il Messaggero carried a substantial portion of the text in its September 23 issue. Il Messaggero reported that the text has been rejected by the Cardinals and bishops who were asked to review the proposed document; the prelates were said to have found the document excessively harsh."

        According to CWN, the document "was drafted by a committee composed of four officials from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and four from the Congregation for Divine Worship." The document reputedly "covers 37 abuses against the Eucharist. Four major sorts of abuse are discussed: the sacrilegious use of the Eucharistic species (bread and wine); the celebration of Mass by someone who does not have proper faculties; concelebration with ministers of other Christian communities; and the consecration of bread and wine for inherently sacrilegious purposes (as in a Black Mass)." The document also disapproves of "liturgical dance" and it "frowns upon the practice of encouraging applause from the congregation during the Eucharistic liturgy — a practice that is common even in St. Peter's basilica."

        Note well: the document disapproves of liturgical dance and applause during the Mass. Yet both of these abuses feature prominently in papal Masses said both within and without the Vatican. Indeed, CWN notes that "According to Il Messaggero the members of the committee that prepared the text were fully aware that their disciplinary norms could apply to the liturgical celebrations within the Vatican, and the draft document could be seen as a criticism of some papal ceremonies."

        Over the past 25 years Roman Catholic traditionalists have been condemned by the neo-Catholic establishment because they rightly object to the appalling spectacles that papal Masses have become. And now the Vatican apparatus — at least its more "conservative" elements — seems willing to correct abuses that have originated in papal liturgies, which set the example for the whole Church.

        It is truly a time of diabolical disorientation in the Church when the correction of liturgical abuses must begin in the Vatican itself. Our Lady of Fatima, deliver us.