"I know a fellow who is living in the house his great-grandfather built. Whenever he mentions this to others, the reaction is spontaneous and always the same: “How cool is that!” (or words to that effect). What’s more, he practices the same profession as his father, who practices the same profession as his father, who practices the same profession as his father, all the way back to that great grandfather. And people usually say, “Wow, that’s wonderful!” Is it necessary? No. But do we see it as a good? Yes, we do."
This idea of community across time and of memory is so important that Ruskin considered permanence and memory to be necessary qualities of (good) architecture. He wrote, "I cannot but think it an evil sign of a people when their houses are built to last for one generation only. ... I say that if men lived like men indeed, their houses would be temples--temples which we should hardly dare to injure, and in which it would make us holy to be permitted to live; and there must be a strange unthankfulness for all that homes have given and parents taught, a strange consciousness that we have been unfaithful to our fathers' honour, or that our own lives are not such as would make our dwellings sacred to our children, when each man would fain build to himself, and build for the little revolution of his own life only."
How much worse when we destroy an ancient liturgy and beautiful ancient churches and replace these with barren contrivances of the little revolutions of our time.
"The tremendous break between modernity and pre-modernity at nearly every point of life has led to an astonishing loneliness in our times."
The loneliness of a world where truth is subjective and everything must serve only the instant.
I really enjoy your work Dr. K, I wish there was a way to make Catholics realise what’s been taken away from us. The large majority don’t know about Tradition and don’t care to read. It’s frustrating but I’m hoping articles like yours get circulated across platforms to make catholics wake up and ask their bishops for things Traditional that have been taken away from us.
"Spouses who cannot have children experience a grief that can be hard to understand until we grasp it as a kind of loneliness—but our languages don’t have a word for the special kind of loneliness of living with no contact with present or future descendants." Well-said, Dr. K. It's especially hard to be childless in the trad world. But that is the Cross we've been given. My people where I live (relatives and other people I grew up with) are dying out. None of my family are practicing the Faith or any version of religion. But my Church people are multiplying: marriages and children galore! Even the local Amish (as deficient as their religion is) communities are growing and in a sense replacing the dying culture here. One strand of tradition is on its way out (including Novus Ordo communities), but two others are vibrant.
LARPing refers to "live-action role playing" where folks dress up as fictional characters in a sense and perform an act or quest. Think of a Midevil or Renaissance fair or reenactment.
I share with your pain of the loss of Tradition most specially of our liturgy. To me, it feels like being “orphaned.” It is indeed disorienting.
Just as being physically orphaned we miss the comfort, things we enjoy, the security of their presence; and without being truly prepared for it.
Maybe despite the intentions
of the people who engineered these changes, they only considered the externals corporate aspects of the liturgy. It now appears they were more interested in making a name for themselves, for the innovation
they had introduced, than for the growth and welfare of the laity.
The statistically supported mass exodus of priests and religious and/or decline of vocations after the introduction of these changes is proof enough that these changes did not enhanced the spiritual aspects they had envisioned to effect for everyone. The number of people who left the Church for being disillusioned by these changes.
It is a fact that by our human nature, we learn, absorb, and enjoy the physical realities through our senses into our soul. Hence being deprived of the things that sustain us spiritually is distressing.
We do have to take into consideration that we are not limited by our senses, although these are the natural
entry points of connecting and expessing ourselves, our spirit get it source not from
the physical world but from
the spiritual world. In my experience, there are things that came to my knowledge by “inspiration.” I believe those who see visions or apparitions do not see by their physical eyes. If it is by physical eyes then, all those who were with the visionaries could have seen what they saw. This is something nobody can impart to anyone but God alone.
We do mourn the loss of our Traditional practices. Just as we mourn the loss of our loved ones. Just as the Apostles mourned the death of Jesus, God did not leave them orphaned, instead God give them eventually his Holy Spirit to each one of them.
Compared to the physical limitation of Jesus’ physical presence in the company of the Apostles, His Spirit is now with each one of them everywhere they are!
As the Holy Spirit was with the Appstles, he is also with us. Let us believe that nobody and no one can limit, thwart, or curtail the presence and power of Holy Spirit in His Church.
"One of the problems I have encountered with the traditionalist community is the tendancy to squirrel information tightly away,"
Interesting observation. I am curious about this; what has been your experience with the squirreling away of information?
The reason I ask is that I find this an intriguing comment in an age where many people seek the traditional Mass but the New Order is doing everything it can to shut down these communities. First it was with games (to avoid the requirement of facilitating the Mass) and now it is explicit directives to shut down the traditional Mass. So I am curious what has given you this impression of hiding information.
God-willing it is just a tendancy for my local community, but the "holier-than-thou" or "know-more-than-thou" mindset in traditionalist circles is something that I haven't seen explored in writing, mostly because so many traditionalist writers participate. I think we traditionalist have a tendancy to... enjoy our suffering, if such a situation could be compared to so many suffering people around the world in and out of the Church. We want to be "ghettoized" to the point where we impose it on ourselves unnecessarily vis a vis homesteading, homeschooling, trying to create our own laity-formed "communities" "just for" those who agree with ourselves. And most detrimental of all we don't or haven't had priest pastor leaders willing or able to form parish communities that would address these rupturing... dare I say sedevacantist-adjacent tendancies. Pride comes before the fall.
I do not see how your comment actually follows from the article. Or is it simply something you wanted to share here?
There is a kind of ghetto that is all the worse for not being recognized as a ghetto. Epistemologically speaking, modernity is the worst ghetto that has ever existed, vis-a-vis the entire Western and indeed human experience of reality, culture, and the sacred. The traditionalists are somewhat isolated in sociological terms but they are connected vertically and horizontally with causes, principles, and elements that make life more human and more divine.
Dr Kwasniewski, I quoted the "offending" section in my first comment. Thank you for your work on Sacred Liturgy and tradition both here and in your published works. My objection is that the lack of strong pastoral leadership in the "on the ground" traditionalist communities makes the formation of spiritual community difficult, even for long time traditionalists, and can run the risk of leaving new and old lovers of tradition out in the cold emotionally and spiritually, especially paired with laity-driven cliques. Keystones are being set and yet the foundation is poorly laid.
I have not seen the tendency that you describe in any traditional community. I have heard some people say that their first impression of a community was that it was stand-offish but usually then if those people make an effort to engage the community they go on to say that they found out it was actually a very welcoming community.
It's possible also that part of the problem all this relates to is the caricatures that the New Order advocates propagated re traditional communities. And you can see this work of propaganda still today. For example, this ridiculous slur of "rigidity." You've probably heard that a few times. But I guess it is effective in its defamatory purpose.
I'm happy you haven't had that experience. It doesn't have anything to do with caricatures or rigidity, but pastoral leadership. And not every community is the same.
Of course. That's why I asked you to elaborate with specifics on your general comment. But you just added other similar general comments. So keep in mind, as you point out, that your observations might just be incidental and not a quality of traditional communities at all. In fact there is nothing at all from what you have said to indicate that the issues you reference generally are not a more common problem in New Order communities than in traditional ones.
"I know a fellow who is living in the house his great-grandfather built. Whenever he mentions this to others, the reaction is spontaneous and always the same: “How cool is that!” (or words to that effect). What’s more, he practices the same profession as his father, who practices the same profession as his father, who practices the same profession as his father, all the way back to that great grandfather. And people usually say, “Wow, that’s wonderful!” Is it necessary? No. But do we see it as a good? Yes, we do."
This idea of community across time and of memory is so important that Ruskin considered permanence and memory to be necessary qualities of (good) architecture. He wrote, "I cannot but think it an evil sign of a people when their houses are built to last for one generation only. ... I say that if men lived like men indeed, their houses would be temples--temples which we should hardly dare to injure, and in which it would make us holy to be permitted to live; and there must be a strange unthankfulness for all that homes have given and parents taught, a strange consciousness that we have been unfaithful to our fathers' honour, or that our own lives are not such as would make our dwellings sacred to our children, when each man would fain build to himself, and build for the little revolution of his own life only."
How much worse when we destroy an ancient liturgy and beautiful ancient churches and replace these with barren contrivances of the little revolutions of our time.
"The tremendous break between modernity and pre-modernity at nearly every point of life has led to an astonishing loneliness in our times."
The loneliness of a world where truth is subjective and everything must serve only the instant.
I really enjoy your work Dr. K, I wish there was a way to make Catholics realise what’s been taken away from us. The large majority don’t know about Tradition and don’t care to read. It’s frustrating but I’m hoping articles like yours get circulated across platforms to make catholics wake up and ask their bishops for things Traditional that have been taken away from us.
"Spouses who cannot have children experience a grief that can be hard to understand until we grasp it as a kind of loneliness—but our languages don’t have a word for the special kind of loneliness of living with no contact with present or future descendants." Well-said, Dr. K. It's especially hard to be childless in the trad world. But that is the Cross we've been given. My people where I live (relatives and other people I grew up with) are dying out. None of my family are practicing the Faith or any version of religion. But my Church people are multiplying: marriages and children galore! Even the local Amish (as deficient as their religion is) communities are growing and in a sense replacing the dying culture here. One strand of tradition is on its way out (including Novus Ordo communities), but two others are vibrant.
S/B. 'Coloquialism'
Please can you explain the meaning of LARPing. I live in the UK. Perhaps I am missing some colonialism.
LARPing refers to "live-action role playing" where folks dress up as fictional characters in a sense and perform an act or quest. Think of a Midevil or Renaissance fair or reenactment.
I share with your pain of the loss of Tradition most specially of our liturgy. To me, it feels like being “orphaned.” It is indeed disorienting.
Just as being physically orphaned we miss the comfort, things we enjoy, the security of their presence; and without being truly prepared for it.
Maybe despite the intentions
of the people who engineered these changes, they only considered the externals corporate aspects of the liturgy. It now appears they were more interested in making a name for themselves, for the innovation
they had introduced, than for the growth and welfare of the laity.
The statistically supported mass exodus of priests and religious and/or decline of vocations after the introduction of these changes is proof enough that these changes did not enhanced the spiritual aspects they had envisioned to effect for everyone. The number of people who left the Church for being disillusioned by these changes.
It is a fact that by our human nature, we learn, absorb, and enjoy the physical realities through our senses into our soul. Hence being deprived of the things that sustain us spiritually is distressing.
We do have to take into consideration that we are not limited by our senses, although these are the natural
entry points of connecting and expessing ourselves, our spirit get it source not from
the physical world but from
the spiritual world. In my experience, there are things that came to my knowledge by “inspiration.” I believe those who see visions or apparitions do not see by their physical eyes. If it is by physical eyes then, all those who were with the visionaries could have seen what they saw. This is something nobody can impart to anyone but God alone.
We do mourn the loss of our Traditional practices. Just as we mourn the loss of our loved ones. Just as the Apostles mourned the death of Jesus, God did not leave them orphaned, instead God give them eventually his Holy Spirit to each one of them.
Compared to the physical limitation of Jesus’ physical presence in the company of the Apostles, His Spirit is now with each one of them everywhere they are!
As the Holy Spirit was with the Appstles, he is also with us. Let us believe that nobody and no one can limit, thwart, or curtail the presence and power of Holy Spirit in His Church.
"One of the problems I have encountered with the traditionalist community is the tendancy to squirrel information tightly away,"
Interesting observation. I am curious about this; what has been your experience with the squirreling away of information?
The reason I ask is that I find this an intriguing comment in an age where many people seek the traditional Mass but the New Order is doing everything it can to shut down these communities. First it was with games (to avoid the requirement of facilitating the Mass) and now it is explicit directives to shut down the traditional Mass. So I am curious what has given you this impression of hiding information.
God-willing it is just a tendancy for my local community, but the "holier-than-thou" or "know-more-than-thou" mindset in traditionalist circles is something that I haven't seen explored in writing, mostly because so many traditionalist writers participate. I think we traditionalist have a tendancy to... enjoy our suffering, if such a situation could be compared to so many suffering people around the world in and out of the Church. We want to be "ghettoized" to the point where we impose it on ourselves unnecessarily vis a vis homesteading, homeschooling, trying to create our own laity-formed "communities" "just for" those who agree with ourselves. And most detrimental of all we don't or haven't had priest pastor leaders willing or able to form parish communities that would address these rupturing... dare I say sedevacantist-adjacent tendancies. Pride comes before the fall.
I do not see how your comment actually follows from the article. Or is it simply something you wanted to share here?
There is a kind of ghetto that is all the worse for not being recognized as a ghetto. Epistemologically speaking, modernity is the worst ghetto that has ever existed, vis-a-vis the entire Western and indeed human experience of reality, culture, and the sacred. The traditionalists are somewhat isolated in sociological terms but they are connected vertically and horizontally with causes, principles, and elements that make life more human and more divine.
Dr Kwasniewski, I quoted the "offending" section in my first comment. Thank you for your work on Sacred Liturgy and tradition both here and in your published works. My objection is that the lack of strong pastoral leadership in the "on the ground" traditionalist communities makes the formation of spiritual community difficult, even for long time traditionalists, and can run the risk of leaving new and old lovers of tradition out in the cold emotionally and spiritually, especially paired with laity-driven cliques. Keystones are being set and yet the foundation is poorly laid.
I agree with this assessment, thanks for explaining better.
I have not seen the tendency that you describe in any traditional community. I have heard some people say that their first impression of a community was that it was stand-offish but usually then if those people make an effort to engage the community they go on to say that they found out it was actually a very welcoming community.
It's possible also that part of the problem all this relates to is the caricatures that the New Order advocates propagated re traditional communities. And you can see this work of propaganda still today. For example, this ridiculous slur of "rigidity." You've probably heard that a few times. But I guess it is effective in its defamatory purpose.
I'm happy you haven't had that experience. It doesn't have anything to do with caricatures or rigidity, but pastoral leadership. And not every community is the same.
Of course. That's why I asked you to elaborate with specifics on your general comment. But you just added other similar general comments. So keep in mind, as you point out, that your observations might just be incidental and not a quality of traditional communities at all. In fact there is nothing at all from what you have said to indicate that the issues you reference generally are not a more common problem in New Order communities than in traditional ones.