THE CHURCH MILITANT - BELEAGUERED BY BERGOGLIANISM

October 21-22, 2017

Canon212.com


Seeing the headline above, my first thought was 'Soylent Green', that futuristic movie where it was thought that human corpses - and not
plankton from the sea as advertised - were being recycled into a food product rationed to hungry people; or, to take the above headline
literally, that garbage (food garbage, presumably) was being recycled for distribution to poor people. Thankfully, that is not the story at all -
and the Canon212 editors should observe a basic rule of journalistic responsibility: Do not knowingly lie and mislead.
cruxnow.com/global-church/2017/10/21/brazilian-cardinal-supports-controversial-food-policy-sa...
And since Canon212 is a Catholic site, surely they must know that falsifying what a news report says by tagging it with a certifiably wrong
headline violates the Eighth Commandment! Yet Canon212 has been merrily doing this with a lot of other stories as well. It is just flat-out,
malicious lying, and it should stop.

As much as I appreciate the site's news aggregation effort for the convenience it provides, it is completely unnecessary for Canon212 to
invent eyecatching but false headlines. While I am at it, there is no need either to attach the prefix 'Francis-' to anything the C212 editors
disagree with or disapprove of. Readers are well aware of C212 biases and don't have to be bludgeoned in the eye by self-evident facts.

I personally do not see anything wrong with recycling soon-to-expire or just-expired (according to the recommended 'sell-by' date) grocery
products that are uncontaminated instead of the groceries simply incinerating them, because in Brazil, right now, apparently, they are
not allowed to donate such products.


PewSitter.com

The link for the banner headline is to a Google translation of a Spanish report, but the gist is that recently, InfoVaticana in Spanish, La Nuova
Bussola in Italian and L'Homme Noveau in French simultaneously published a letter by Cardinal Sarah saying that despite the authorization
given by the pope in the motu proprio Magnum Principiam for national bishops' conferences to publish their own translation of the Roman Missal
to the vernacular, the Vatican still retains the final authority to recognize and accept such translations.

The pope has since written Cardinal Sarah to 'correct' him, and I shall translate Bussola's account of it - in which the Vatican tells Bussola that
the pope wants his 'correction' to Sarah published in full - a probably unprecedented papal demand on a media outlet. (One assumes
the two other sites which published Sarah's letter also received the same communication from the pope.)

Anyway, I shall translate Bussola's account of this probably landmark event, but my immediate reaction goes even beyond editor Riccardo Cascioli's
guarded comment on the consequences implied by the pope's position: It used to be that because of all the local 'initiatives' by priests
imposing themselves on the Novus Ordo Mass, Catholics could no longer as in centuries past be sure that they could attend the same Mass wherever
in the world they happened to be.

Now, it is not just the rubrics and external aspects of the Mass that can be autonomously determined by a parish or a Mass celebrant, and therefore
differ from place to place. Now the pope has just authorized even the content of the Mass itself to be autonomously determined by the
bishops'conferences - because that is what they can do by authorizing a translation they approve of. One can expect that it will no longer
be just a 'translation' from the Latin, but even a free-form rendition of what the bishops' conference thinks the Mass should be saying. (First 'victim'
of this autonomy, since it already is - despite Benedict XVI's correction - is the wrong and wrong-headed translation of 'pro multis' in the words
of the Consecration of the Wine to 'for all' instead of 'for many'. But then Bergoglianism finds 'pro multis' exclusivist so it ought to have no
place in the Mass, whereby JMB is once more editing words attributed to Jesus himself, these ones at the Last Supper.)

This is nothing less than liturgical anarchy - parallel to the pastoral anarchy proliferated by Amoris laetitia, it makes Catholicism
the victim of Bergoglian laissez-faire: "Let everyone do as they discern", being the euphemism for "Let everyone do as they please"
and an alternate formulation for "Let everyone follow his own conscience".

This anarchy is the logical and foresseable consequence of Bergoglio's idea, expressed in Evangelium gaudium, to allow bishops'
conferences full doctrinal authority, presumably without regard to what the rest of the Church is doing. This is no longer
the Catholic Church, in which 'catholic' means universal. Bergoglianism is now imposing a fragmentation of the universal Church
through a series of fiats effectively dissolving the unity and universality of the Holy, Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church. No
Correctio, filial or fraternal, will remedy this - only an act of God will.

If anyone still thinks this pope is not anti-Catholic and is not apostate, please wake up and face the facts!

Consider also the plethora of pro-Luther Bergoglian hype in the headlines these days - but I will come back to that later. Aldo Maria Valli
already did an excellent kick-off for this expose of growing Berglutheranism preached by the apostate Jorge Martin Bergluther.


Pope sends ‘Correctio fraternalis’
to Cardinal Sarah
by Riccardo Cascioli, Editor
Translated from

Oct. 22, 2017

Cardinal Robert Sarah’s interpretation of the motu proprio ‘Magnum Principium’ is incorrect – the spirit of the papal document is precisely to allow bishops’ conferences to carry out their own liturgical translations with autonomy and [the pope’s] trust which Cardinal Sarah would like to limit.

Pope Francis himself makes this clear in a letter to the Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of Sacraments, a letter we are publishing in full at the explicit request of the pope himself.

It was our news outlet that had published Cardinal Sarah’s note last Oct. 12 in which, taking note of already manifested reactions, he proposed the right interpretation of the motu proprio.

Having done that, we are now being asked by the pope to publish his own letter – an unprecedented gesture on the part of a pope.

Beyond the questions of merits discussed below, we are honored and thankful for this attention from the Holy Father which objectively confers on LNBQ the authority to host a debate on subjects fundamental to the life of the Church in which it has been a protagonist along with some cardinals.

But let us get to the point of the controversy – which has to do with the translations from the official Latin editions of liturgical texts used in different countries. Till now, the translations (versions and eventual adaptations) have been
prepared by each national bishops’ conference which then seek the approval of the Holy See. This is done through two instruments – confirmatio and recognitio – which, however, the motu proprio seeks to redefine.

At this point, here are the existing interpretations:
Cardinal Sarah says that confirmatio and recognitio are different and distinct in their effects, in which confirmatio refers to approval of a translation from the editio typica Latina of the missal [in Church language, the editio typica is the official source text of a particular document or book, and it always used to be in Latin, from which all translations should be made], whereas recognitio refers to approval of new texts and ritual modifications that are not substantial, yet they are identical acts from the point of view of the responsibility of the Holy See. Thus, in both cases, the Vatican can analyze every request for translation approval – translations from the typical Latin edition, changes in ritual, and new texts.

Cardinal Sarah’s concern, as CDW Prefect, is evident: to keep the unity of the Church even in the liturgy, while respecting the autonomy of bishops in each country to elaborate their own local liturgy [in conformity with the universal Church].

But now the pope has let it be known that this is not the spirit of his motu proprio, which must instead be seen as a true and proper liturgical ‘devolution’. He argues that confirmatio and recognitio are not identical [Sarah did not say that!], and that in the exercise of these two actions, the responsibility is different for the Holy See from the responsibility of the bishops’ conferences. [But it looks like he is taking away any responsibility from the Holy See regarding liturgical translations.]

He makes these distinctions:
a) Recognitio “only refers to the verification and preservation of conformity to canon law and to the communion of the Church”. It is a rather hermetic term, but it should probably be interpreted in the words used by Mons. Arthur Roche, CDW secretary, which accompanied the publication of Magnum Principium: “Recognitio… implies the process of acknowledgment on the part of the Apostolic See of legitimate liturgical adaptations, including ‘more profound’ ones, that the episcopal conferences can establish and approve for their territories, within allowed limits. On this ground of encounter between liturgy and culture, the Apostolic See is therefore called on to recognize – that is, to review and evaluate such adaptations by way of preserving the substantial unity of the Roman rite.
[Is that not precisely what Cardinal Sarah is saying???]

b) Confirmatio is the act on which the pope’s letter chooses to focus. In which he says very clearly that the judgment regarding the faithfulness of liturgical translations to the typical Latin edition belongs to the bishops’ conferences “in dialog with the Holy See”, which, in conceding the confirmation, will no longer carry out a “detailed word-by-word examination” of such translations, with the exception of evident questions in important formulations such as the Eucharistic Prayers or the formulas used in sacramental rites. In short, much more freedom is allowed to the bishops’ conferences. [But any examination of any ‘official’ translation ought to be ‘word by word’ – it can’t be a generic examination - “Well, it looks like, in general, it is saying what it ought to say, so it should be OK”, and has nothing to do with whether the part examined has ‘substantial’ or ‘insubstantial’ content.]

In his letter to Cardinal Sarah, the pope points out that his motu proprio effectively re-interprets or abrogates some part of Liturgiam Authenticam (2001), which has been the normative document for liturgical translations till now. Nos. 79-84 of LA regarding the approval and recognition of translations by the Apostolic See must be ‘re-understood’; while Nos. 76 and 80 have been abrogated. The latter is about recognition, and has obviously been re-formulated in MP, while No. 76 called on the CDW to participate “very closely in the work of translating into the principal languages” [So now the pope is saying that this has been abrogated - there is no longer going to be any close collaboration on translation? I'm not being 'discriminatory' but would the very small dioceses that the pope has been honoring with new cardinals really have people competent enough to translate from liturgical Latin to say, the vernacular in Myanmar? I'm not even sure we have such competent clerical translators in the Philippines where there are like 70 million Catholics!]

One other part of the pope’s letter demands attention. He says, “Magnum Principium no longer sustains that translations should conform in all points to the norms of Liturgiam Authenticam, as required in the past”. This statement, along with the statement that a ‘faithful’ liturgical translation ‘implies a three-fold faithfulness’ (to the text, to the language of translation, and to the comprehensibility of the translation to those who will use it) – tells us that MP is intended as the start of a process that can go very far indeed.

And here is the significance of this new ‘conflict’ in which the pope corrects Cardinal Sarah, who has only acted along the lines laid down by Benedict XVI on the liturgy. Indeed, there is no doubt that the spirit of MP, as defined and stressed in Pope Francis’s letter to Cardinal Sarah, is to move towards ‘national’ Missals that will inevitably be increasingly different among themselves, rather than a shared ‘spirit of the liturgy’.

The issue goes beyond the merely liturgical aspect, as Cardinal Ratzinger (and later as Benedict XVI) insisted repeatedly, about the very idea of ‘Church’ and the Church’s own understanding of what she is. The larger issue here is the role and powers of the bishops’ conferences, to whom Pope Francis intends to give ‘authentic doctrinal authority’, as he wrote in Evangelii Gaudium No, 32.

But on the contrary, as early as his 1985 book-length interview with Vittorio Messori, Rapporto sulla Fede (pubished in English as 'The Ratzinger Report'), Cardinal Ratzinger, as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, while commenting positively on the proper appreciation of “the role and responsibility of a bishop” as defined by Vatican-II, lamented a negative post-conciliar drift in this respect:

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“The idea of reaffirming the role of a bishop has in fact been diluted or even outright suffocated by the assertiveness of prelates in bishops’ conferences that are increasingly organized and heavily bureaucratic.

"But we must not forget that bishops’ conferences do not have a theological basis, they do not form part of the Church’s ineliminable structure as Christ wished it, and that they only have a practical, concrete function. [Principally, to coordinate actions of the different diocesan bishops in each country, and to provide them with a locus of interaction with one another.]

He was saying that the collective cannot replace the individual bishop.
“This is a decisive point, because it has to do with preserving the very nature of the Catholic Church, which is based on an episcopal structure, not on some kind of federation of national churches. The ‘national’ level is not an ecclesial dimension.

"It is necessary to make clear once more that in every diocese, there is but one pastor and teacher of the faith [the bishop as a successor to the Apostles], in communion with other bishops and with the Vicar of Christ.”

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BTW, call it quibbling over 'trivia', but please note how the pope signs himself in the letter - simply as 'Francesco'.

Should not any communication from the pope qua pope (he is not writing an informal personal note to Sarah here, from one friend to another, but an official 'correction' of a curial dicastery head) be formally signed, in this case, "Francesco PP", as all other popes have signed themselves officially with the qualificative PP?

Since I have not really been following the minutiae of his pontificate, I do not know if he has ever signed himself 'Francesco PP', or if it has always been just 'Francesco', as if he were the only 'Francesco' in the world or in history. I do not know whether to say he is doing an ego trip a la popstar one-namers like Madonna and Cher, or the ultimate ego trip as in "God" who requires no prefix, suffix or qualifier.

I shall post a translation of the pope's letter itself later - not so much for what he says but for how he says it, and the tone of the letter, in general. Its ending is particularly sarcastic.

P.S. Before I go into a translation of the Pope's letter, I must post earlier material for proper backgrounding. On Oct. 13, Edward Pentin had this article:

Cardinal Sarah confirms that Vatican
retains last word on translations
The prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship discusses
the effects of the Pope’s recent revisions to canon law
governing the translation of liturgical texts
by Edward Pentin


VATICAN CITY, Oct. 13, 2017 — Cardinal Robert Sarah has weighed in on Magnum Principium, Pope Francis's motu proprio on liturgical translations, reassuring the faithful that the Vatican will continue to safeguard any changes or new liturgical translations to ensure they remain faithful to the original Latin.

In an article in the French Catholic journal L’Homme Nouveau, the prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments (CDW) confirmed that the motu proprio’s changes to Canon 838 — which shifts some responsibility for translating liturgical texts away from the Vatican to local bishops — will still require the Vatican to give approval to any such changes or translations.

The article, officially dated Oct. 1 — the day on which Magnum Principium (The Great Principle) came into effect — bolsters the guidance issued with the motu proprio by Archbishop Arthur Roche, secretary of the CDW. Archbishop Roche stressed that the Vatican’s role in confirming texts remains an “authoritative act” presupposing “fidelity” to the original Latin.

Cardinal Sarah’s statements on the matter contradict those who see the motu proprio as a gateway to more liberal vernacular interpretations of liturgical texts, inconsistent with their Latin original.

The Holy Father, who signed Magnum Principium Sept. 3, authorized changes to Canon 838 that decentralized the translation process, giving local bishops responsibility for translating liturgical texts, while retaining the Vatican’s authority to approve or reject a proposed translation. [But the Pope's Oct. 15 letter directly contradicts what his Motu Proprio says, as follows (in the English version provided by the Vatican):

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§2. It is for the Apostolic See to order the sacred liturgy of the universal Church, publish liturgical books, recognise adaptations approved by the Episcopal Conference according to the norm of law, and exercise vigilance that liturgical regulations are observed faithfully everywhere.

§3. It pertains to the Episcopal Conferences to faithfully prepare versions of the liturgical books in vernacular languages, suitably accommodated within defined limits, and to ]b]approve and publish the liturgical books for the regions for which they are responsible after the confirmation of the Apostolic See.

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[The boldface parts are in the original, the underscoring is mine.]

The CDW will no longer instruct bishops to make proposed amendments, but retains authority to confirm or veto the results at the end of the process.

Among other consequences, this means that the Vatican commission Vox Clara, which was established by Pope John Paul II in 2002 to help the CDW vet English translations, will no longer be needed.

The Pope said he made the changes because of “difficulties” that unsurprisingly have sometimes arisen between the Vatican and bishops’ conferences. He added that he wanted “a vigilant and creative collaboration full of reciprocal trust” between the Holy See and bishops’ conferences, so that the renewal of “the whole liturgical life might continue.”

It, therefore, “seemed opportune,” he said, “that some principles handed on since the time of the Council should be more clearly reaffirmed and put into practice.”

Pentin's article, however, unduly condenses what Cardinal Sarah wrote. I am translating from what was published in Bussola, one of the three media outlets to which Cardinal Sarah provided the following commentary on ‘Magnum Principium’. Its very title indicates his intention was to help in the correct understanding of the motu proprio…

A humble contribution towards a better and
more correct understanding of ‘Magnum Principium’
The ‘recognitio’ of adaptations and the ‘confirmatio’ of translations in Canon 838
by Cardinal Robert Sarah
Translated from

October 12, 2017

On September 2, 2017, the Holy Father promulgated the motu proprio Magnum Principium on liturgical translations, modifying Paragraphs 2 and 3 of Canon 838 in the Code of Canon Law. We welcome with respect and adknowledgment this initiative of the Supreme Pontiff which allows a clearer and more rigorous definition of the respective responsibilities of episcopal confeences and of the Holy See towards a collaboration of fraternal and utter trust in the service of the Church.

This point, which in some way constitutes the heart of the motu proprio, is amplified in depth by a letter sent on Sept.26 by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of Sacraments to the various episcopal conferences. It is in this perspective that I have drawn up this humble contribution, starting from the following observation: on the part of our dicastery, collaboration in the work of adaptation and translation done by the episcopal conferences is totally included in tw words from Canon 838: recognitio and confirmatio. What do they mean exactly? The purpose of this simple text is to reply to that question.

Canon 838 before ‘Magnum Principium’:
Can. 838 — § 1. Sacrae liturgiae moderatio ab Ecclesiae auctoritate unice pendet: quae quidem est penes Apostolicam Sedem et, ad normam iuris, penes Episcopum dioecesanum.
§ 2. Apostolicae Sedis est sacram liturgiam Ecclesiae universae ordinare, libros liturgicos edere eorumque versiones in linguas vernaculas recognoscere, necnon advigilare ut ordinationes liturgicae ubique fideliter observentur.
§ 3. Ad Episcoporum conferentias spectat versiones librorum liturgicorum in linguas vernaculas, convenienter intra limites in ipsis libris liturgicis definitos aptatas, parare, easque edere, praevia recognitione Sanctae Sedis.
§ 4. Ad Episcopum dioecesanum in Ecclesia sibi commissa pertinet, intra limites suae competentiae, normas de re liturgica dare, quibus omnes tenentur.
Translation:
Can. 838 §1. The direction of the sacred liturgy depends solely on the authority of the Church which resides in the Apostolic See and, according to the norm of law, the diocesan bishop.
§2. It is for the Apostolic see to order the sacred liturgy of the universal Church, piblish liturgical books and review their translations in vernacular languages, and exercise vigilance that liturgical regulations are observed faithfully everywhere.
§3. It pertains to the conferences of bishops to prepare and publish, after the prior review of the Holy See, translations of liturgical books in vernacular languages, adapted appropriately within the limitscdefined in the liturgical books themselves.
§4. Within the limits of his competence, it pertains to the diocesan bishop in the Church entrusted to him to issue liturgical norms which bind everyone.