Editor’s note: This essay is reprinted from the Radical Fidelity blog on Substack.
Long before the SSPX consecrations and the consequent excommunications, I and others — unlike Trad. Inc. — warned with monotonous regularity that the overarching issue is not the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) alone, but the new Vatican II religion issuing from Rome.
We have stated repeatedly that there could be no compromise over the liturgy while adhering to the false Synodal anti-Catholic religion.
At this late stage of total apostasy in the Synodal Abomination, one does not need to be a prophet to predict that, in the wake of the SSPX excommunications, Rome will use access to the TLM as the bargaining chip to keep “Traditional” Catholics on a short leash and domesticated within the Synodal Church.
Mainstream voices call for liberalization
This past week, it has been telling how a choir of voices from within the kosher postconciliar concentration camp has called for exactly that: unity with error in exchange for access to the TLM.
Among the earliest episcopal responses was that of Bishop Czesław Kozon of Copenhagen. Speaking to Catholic News Agency, Kozon argued that the older liturgy should continue to have a place within the life of the Church, observing that the “Old Mass” should remain available so long as there are believers “who like to have it and are associated with it.”
A similar position was adopted by Bishop Fredrik Hansen of Oslo in a pastoral letter issued after the SSPX consecrations. Addressing Catholics who had attended SSPX chapels because of their attachment to the pre-conciliar liturgy, Hansen wrote directly to those “who are attracted to the pre-conciliar liturgy and the spirituality associated with it.” He pledged that, “if it is necessary and it serves for the good of the Church and of souls, I will also expand this kind of Mass celebration in our local Church.”
Perhaps the most high-profile intervention came from Archbishop Georg Gänswein, former personal secretary to Benedict XVI and now Apostolic Nuncio to the Baltic States.
In an interview with the Corriere della Sera, Gänswein argued that the arch-heretic Francis had been “wrong” to impose the restrictions contained in Traditionis Custodes, insisting that the decision “can and must be corrected.” He further proposed that Rome should become “more flexible, generous and paternal” toward Catholics attached to the traditional liturgy. Wow, Georg, how generous of you to beg the modernist heretics to allow us access to what is rightfully ours!
Other senior prelates likewise proposed institutional solutions. Cardinal Gerhard Müller criticized the suppression of the former Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, describing its abolition as an “error” because important competencies had been dispersed. He advocated the creation of a new body possessing “some independence and autonomy” that could address both the liturgical and doctrinal questions surrounding traditionalist communities seeking full communion.
The Dispatch
In a similar vein, Cardinal Kurt Koch, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, argued that the Church should reconsider the application of Traditionis Custodes so as to accommodate Catholics devoted to the Traditional Latin Mass who did not share what he described as the “ideology” of the SSPX. What Koch, of course, means by “ideology” is Catholicism. As long as you renounce the Catholic faith, they will let you have the TLM, which means nothing without the accompanying Catholic doctrine it represents.
Sell-out “Traditional” religious communities in full communion with Apostate Rome echoed these appeals. The Fraternity of Saint Vincent Ferrer, while reaffirming fidelity to the un-Holy See, asked the usurpers to demonstrate “paternal solicitude” toward “all those Catholic faithful who feel themselves linked to some previous liturgical and disciplinary forms of the Latin tradition,” quoting directly from Ecclesia Dei.
Lay voices promote Latin Mass-ism
These episcopal and religious interventions were reinforced by influential lay organizations.
Joseph Shaw, chairman of the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales, unequivocally rejected the SSPX’s unilateral episcopal consecrations, yet argued that the Synodal Church should reassure those Synodalists who wished to remain fully enslaved while preserving their liturgical heritage. He expressed the hope that the crisis would lead “to a change, reassuring those who don’t support the society’s action and wish to separate the liturgy from any thought of schism.” Shaw stressed that attachment to the Traditional Latin Mass should never be equated with support for canonical rupture with the heretical Synodal Religion.
The Latin Mass Society and Foederatio Internationalis Una Voce jointly reaffirmed their communion with Rome while warning against allowing restrictions on the traditional liturgy to drive otherwise faithful Synodalists toward the margins of ecclesial life. (Margins, in this case, of course, means driving them to Catholicism.)
Another treacherous proposal came from Fr. Dominic White, O.P., Prior of Blackfriars Hall, Oxford. While insisting that “being Catholic means being in full and regular communion,” White nevertheless argued that every diocese should make provision for the Traditional Latin Mass at “a convenient time and place.”
He further suggested the establishment of a canonical structure similar to the Personal Ordinariates, thereby providing a stable ecclesial home for Catholics attached to the older liturgy without requiring any compromise in communion with the Holy See. In other words, White wants Catholicism to be reduced to a side freak show in the Synodal circus.
You get the picture.
What will probably happen next is that Leo XIV will come with a very generous gesture, such as “freeing up” access to the TLM (in exchange for obedience to the false religion), just enough to dupe the faithful into thinking he is the good guy (I can already hear the slobbering, sycophantic praise coming from the Trad Inc. camp).
Once everyone is neatly rounded up into the cage, in the not-too-distant future, a change to the TLM will be announced that will either be a hybrid between the TLM and the Novus Ordo Missae, or simply the Novus Ordo Missae in Latin.
And all the good little “Trads” will have to obey.
Whatever you do, do not succumb to this trade-off, which is akin to Esau selling his birthright. Worse still, do not let the TLM become the “30 pieces of silver” for which you betray Christ and the Catholic Church.
