We Won't Need Another Generation

    Back in Holy Week, a Facebook Friend picked up on a very brief reflection (not much more than a paragraph) I had offered on my hopes and expectations for the future of the Vetus Ordo within the Church. She wrote:

     Your Excellency,

May I ask you privately a delicate, indiscrete and complete undiplomatic question that you obviously don’t need to answer. What piece of the puzzle have you seen when you published this incredible sentence last weekend: "The Lord has convinced me that we won't need another generation to be able to see and rejoice in the Church's consolation through the restoration of the Sacred Liturgy in all its glory."

    Cum Ave, Eva

    In my reflection, I had announced or half promised, but almost sine die, that I would produce a systematic treatment on what inspires me in the Vetus Ordo and thus explain the reason for my hope in its future. Eva's request for an explanation kind of caught me off guard. Here is how I sort of responded to her question:

    Hi, Eva! Greetings from South Dakota!

    The best answer I can give you is that I really will have to do a more systematic and complete treatment of the topic in order to be able to explain myself. What inspired the sentence you quoted was the great consolation I experience now in retirement, being able to regularly celebrate the Vetus Ordo Low Mass in my chapel here at home in Sioux Falls.

    You might say, that I am expressing my confidence in the holiness of the Church and my hope that many more older priests and bishops will be won over by the experience of the Vetus Ordo. More later, when I am able to publish something systematic on the topic! Have a blessed Easter!

    Caveat emptor! As they say. I am still not there in terms of working the thing out. But Low Sunday/Divine Mercy Sunday and the repetition today Monday of that beautiful Mass with its Epistle from 1John 5 pushed me slightly over the edge. What I think I want to do is sketch out, not even really outlinewithout any particular order a few of the reasons for my hope. 

    a) Sadly, you might say, the Novus Ordo mainstream is losing it. They consider us about as extreme as they hold the dear departed Hans Kueng on the left or so many transgressives who still insist on calling themselves Catholic. The Novus Ordo embraces neither us nor them, but seeks to hold down what they fashion as middle ground. We see it in their irrational rage against people who somehow do not toe the line on COVID restrictions at Mass or "deviate" from their lock-step pattern for renewed liturgy. Many good people are not abandoning the Church but are withdrawing from the center so-called in search of a home. Daily ever more of these good people find their way to us.

    b) Our fair weather priest friends are increasing in number. My guess is they are mostly middle aged and are not personally won over by the Vetus Ordo. These are the men who generously, selflessly celebrate the Old Rite out of genuine solicitude for the faithful who request it of them. And the people will carry them, perhaps evening winning them over.

    c) Most importantly, I guess, I am looking to my own "old man's" "old priest's" heart and rejoicing maybe yet from afar in what I shared with Eva: I am expressing my confidence in the holiness of the Church and my hope that many more older priests and bishops will be won over by the experience of the Vetus Ordo. Especially my brother bishops would I encourage to allow themselves to be carried by the young people in the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice and look at the possibility of committing to the old Breviary.

    When I get around to writing my treatise, the ars celebrandi of the Vetus Ordo will certainly take the yeoman's share of explaining or illustrating my optimism in our bright future. For priests and others who pray the Old Office let me simply note the way the core message of 1 John 5 is sported through both Mass and Breviary for this Sunday and Monday. My guess would be that the preponderant number of Novus Ordo preachers gathered the inspiration from elsewhere. In doing so, permit me to say that they fell short of what the confession of Thomas the Apostle can bring to bear on our world.

    I think I will stop there and file this report as one more stone in an edifice that, please God, I might find both the time and the eloquence to properly and completely present. 

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI