Even if, somehow, I could be convinced of the exclusive dogmas of Rome, things like the above are why I could never become a Roman Catholic. I hear the defenders of Rome that things like this are really liturgical "abuses " and that the "true" culture and Roman worship should not be thus. But if a Catholic event, which is global and first order, such as the World Youth Day (this video is for WYD 2013), has as protagonists the successors of the apostles themselves and dancing in front of the Pope himself, where is the exact official real worship? This I think it looks official enough.
I've met more than one person who converted to Roman Catholicism by what he had read and, then, when he saw this kind of thing (or even the bland quasi-Lutheran liturgy which is the largest part of the worship of current Catholics), finished leaving . I can understand someone who leaves the religion after experiencing abuse (though I'd rather see them go to some form of religion where there is no such abuse), but it is hard to argue that the liturgy of Rome which one sees almost everywhere is an abuse, particularly when such is shown worldwide with official approval of the Vatican. The Roman ecclesiology, with its emphasis on the papacy , makes it even more difficult than it sounds convincing a counter argument. If the Pope himself consents, it is very hard to argue that what you see in this video is an abuse.
And I'm also wondering how one could find it difficult to return to the ancient Roman liturgical tradition which St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco, among others, said "is far older than any of the heresies".
You can read more about this in Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy , the contribution of P. John Whiteford with the title Unfortunate Trends in the Roman Catholic Church (Unfortunate trends in the Roman Catholic Church).
1 comment:
I'm Roman Catholic and I agree 100%.
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