Dear Parishioners,

Last week I spoke about how there were thousands of reports of liturgical abuses and sacrileges occurring in the months and years immediately following the implementation of the “Novus Ordo” Mass flooding into the Vatican. Inspite of that, Blessed Paul VI promoted Msgr. Bugnini to be Titular Bishop of Diocletiana in March of 1972. After that, we don’t
know for sure what happened. Did someone whom Paul VI know and trust speak to him and truly explain the gravity of the situation that was unfolding in the Church? In addition to the reports, many requests were starting to flow in from religious sisters asking to be dispensed from their vows and priests requesting secularization. At any rate, something happened that truly changed Blessed Paul VI’s outlook on the situation and he said very profoundly on June 29, 1972, “Through some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the Church.” Msgr. Bugnini was then removed from the Congregation of Divine Worship and sent as the apostolic delegate to Iraq. Maybe this was too late, extensive damage to the faith life of the Church had already been done. Many of you may be thinking, well what do reforms in the Mass have to do with the mass exodus of priests and religious sisters from their vocations, the great reduction of young people responding to the vocational call, and the subsequent closing of many seminaries, convents, schools, etc.

At the Vatican Council, the Eucharistic Celebration (the Mass) was called the source and summit of our faith. When the Mass is done poorly, rife with sacrilege and superficiality, the faith is negatively impacted at its core, as we have seen over the past 50 years, very little good can come from that. This is why St. John Paul II would later concentrate on trying to clean up the abuses, but it was a fight that lasted throughout his 27-year pontificate, a fight that Pope Emeritus Benedict picked up with great zeal, as he is the greatest liturgist in the Church today, but inspite of the hard work of these Popes, many abuses continue. We know that they have had some success because the number of vocations, especially to the priesthood, is beginning to increase and the spate catholic institutional closures has abated and new foundations are starting to offset them. One of the areas that the liturgical abuses have most affected the Church has been in the religious education of the youth. We have two generations of Catholics who were very ignorant of their faith and for that reason many of them seek to avoid God, the Holy Mass and the sacraments.

Dear Parishioners,
Last week I spoke about how there were thousands of reports of liturgical abuses and sacrileges occurring in the months and years immediately following the implementation of the “Novus Ordo” Mass flooding into the Vatican. Inspite of that, Blessed Paul VI promoted Msgr. Bugnini to be Titular Bishop of Diocletiana in March of 1972. After that, we don’t
know for sure what happened. Did someone whom Paul VI know and trust speak to him and truly explain the gravity of the situation that was unfolding in the Church? In addition to the reports, many requests were starting to flow in from religious sisters asking to be dispensed from their vows and priests requesting secularization. At any rate, something happened that truly changed Blessed Paul VI’s outlook on the situation and he said very profoundly on June 29, 1972, “Through some fissure the smoke of Satan has entered the Church.” Msgr. Bugnini was then removed from the Congregation of Divine Worship and sent as the apostolic delegate to Iraq. Maybe this was too late, extensive damage to the faith life of the Church had already been done. Many of you may be thinking, well what do reforms in the Mass have to do with the mass exodus of priests and religious sisters from their vocations, the great reduction of young people responding to the vocational call, and the subsequent closing of many seminaries, convents, schools, etc.

At the Vatican Council, the Eucharistic Celebration (the Mass) was called the source and summit of our faith. When the Mass is done poorly, rife with sacrilege and superficiality, the faith is negatively impacted at its core, as we have seen over the past 50 years, very little good can come from that. This is why St. John Paul II would later concentrate on trying to clean up the abuses, but it was a fight that lasted throughout his 27-year pontificate, a fight that Pope Emeritus Benedict picked up with great zeal, as he is the greatest liturgist in the Church today, but inspite of the hard work of these Popes, many abuses continue. We know that they have had some success because the number of vocations, especially to the priesthood, is beginning to increase and the spate catholic institutional closures has abated and new foundations are starting to offset them. One of the areas that the liturgical abuses have most affected the Church has been in the religious education of the youth. We have two generations of Catholics who were very ignorant of their faith and for that reason many of them seek to avoid God, the Holy Mass and the sacraments.

(to be continued)