Sunday, May 17, 2020

The "New Normal" Eucharist Is Near-Never?

It seems that Jansenism Lite has begun infecting Catholic interwebz pundits. 

This is the suddenly-emerging school which is attempting to make the case for INFREQUENT Communion because that's the way it was in the Good Old Days and after all, Catholics are big sinners (serious sin!!) and so they're sacrilegious, too!!  This thing apparently began in England, but it got here fast.

Used to be that one could be suspected of the Evil of "Vatican II thinking".  NOW one can be suspected of the Evil of "St. Pius X thinking".  I smell an advancing antiquarianism, condemned by St. Pius XII--but hey!  He never questioned St. Pius X's teaching, so he's probably a suspect, too.

As a matter of interest, here's a bit of St. Pius X's writing.  See if it rings any bells.

For who can fail to see that society is at the present time, more than in any past age, suffering from a terrible and deep rooted malady which, developing every day and eating into its inmost being, is dragging it to destruction?

You understand, Venerable Brethren, what this disease is – apostasy from God

We find extinguished among the majority of men all respect for the Eternal God, and no regard paid in the manifestations of public and private life to the Supreme Will – nay, every effort and every artifice is used to destroy utterly the memory and the knowledge of God …

Such, in truth, is the audacity and the wrath employed everywhere in persecuting religion, in combatting the dogmas of the faith, in brazen effort to uproot and destroy all relations between man and the Divinity!...
That was the basis of Pius' request for frequent--even daily--Communion.


What changed?  Yes, I know that some (many?) Catholics commit sacrilege by receiving in an unworthy state of soul.  Some even manage to sin by receiving within the 1-hour fast requirement.  Is it news to laymen, priests, and ex-Episcopalians that men sin?  Really??



And yes, this is not dogma, nor doctrine; it's praxis.  So maybe Fr. Z should stop distributing Communion during Mass, like in the Good Old Days?  Or Taylor Marshall should make himself (and his wife) worthy be refraining from the marital act for a suitable time before Communion?  (Yup.  Read it at this link, along with a pretty good history of the practices.)

Sheesh.  Clearly, The Imprisonment of CCCV is giving some people far too much time alone. 

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