Common sense dictates that Cardinal Arthur Roche, who has been the Prefect of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments since 2021, would be the most knowledgeable person in Rome to consult when it comes to liturgical affairs.
It would indeed be strange if he and Leo XIV didn’t have an occasional powwow to make sure they are on the same liturgical page.
If that is true — and we assume it is — there is now very bad news for Trad. Inc. and those who put themselves in the Conciliar Concentration Camp.
In an interview with the British Catholic publication The Tablet on July 29, the following exchange took place between the interviewer and Roche:
The Tablet: Will it be as important to Pope Leo as it was to Pope Francis to restrict the celebration of the Tridentine Mass?
Cardinal Roche: Well, let me say, first of all, it’s a very complex area. And it’s a very important area because the Eucharist is the sacrament of unity: it’s the place where we should all be able to be together to celebrate Mass. So if it begins to divide us, there’s something seriously amiss. But no, Pope Leo is not going to change Traditionis Custodes, and he’s not going back to Summorum Pontificum.
It’s interesting. When I meet with groups who want the antecedent liturgy, and I say: ‘Well, the Holy Father has given you that, so what’s the problem?’, they can’t answer. But then they go away and say, ‘We’re still being persecuted.’ In what way persecuted? Why is the band still playing a tune that is discordant with the life of the Church?’
The Tablet: So if I were an old lady who had grown up with the Tridentine Mass, would Roche be telling me that the way I had practiced as a child had been wrong?
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Cardinal Roche: No. What Vatican II did was to say that the Church needs to be more missionary than it had been. And that, to prepare people to be missionary, the very central core of the life of the Church, which is the Eucharist, has to nourish people in a different way. The abundant diet of Scripture that is now given through the celebration of the Mass and the sacraments is something that wasn’t available to us before, but it is now … in fact, when the Mass is being celebrated, because the baptized people are a priestly people, they too are celebrating with the priest.
The ‘zip it’ policy was never going to work
Besides the ludicrous statement in this exchange where Roche claims that “when the Mass is being celebrated, because the baptized people are a priestly people, they too are celebrating with the priest,” Roche maintains that Leo is not going to repeal Traditionis Custodes or revive Summorum Pontificum.
Short of saying we told you so, this comes as no surprise to anyone who has had ears to hear and eyes to see over the past 13 years.
To recount every single incident that indicated the writing was on the wall would be well beyond the scope of this article, but suffice it to say that it was clear all along that if Francis restricted the Traditional Latin Mass, then Prevost was going to be the one to deal it its final death blow.
From the excommunication of the SSPX, to looking the other way while bishops in the US persecute Traditional Catholics, to Leo’s suggestion that clergy say the Novus Ordo in Latin, it is clear that the Vatican has no plans to bring back Catholicism to its rightful place in Rome.
Just yesterday — without being privy to Roche’s interview — Integrity published an article warning that this is exactly what was going happen in the near future. Integrity has now been vindicated and, without a doubt, will be vindicated again in the future when more Latin Masses will be shut down or integrated with the Novus Ordo liturgical books.
All that remains to be seen now is the degree of dissonance with which Trad. Inc. influencers are going to try to weasel their way out of this one.
