July 2024 Print

By Fr. Ian Andrew Palko, SSPX

Normally, a writer, especially on the theological subjects, should exclude himself from the narrative. Anecdotes are quite useless for demonstrating any universal truth, because one cannot logically argue from particulars to universals with certainty. What is true for one, may not be for many, or what is true for many, not for all. In fact, such personal accounts tend to belie a Modernistic approach to one’s religion, as if one’s concept of God should be formed by experiences.

Yet this writer thinks it imperative to introduce, now, a first-person pronoun, for the benefit of the reader and make what follows relatable. For, you see, despite being a Traditional Catholic priest, I am a “convert” to the traditional Catholic world, or perhaps better said a “Tradvert.” Not a convert to Catholicism—having been since infancy a Catholic—but introduced to the Mass of St. Pius V in my days at Georgetown University. As I often tell people, it was the Jesuits there who brought me to Tradition, and not because of their orthodoxy or apostolic zeal. Rather, it was because even an unstudied, somewhat liberally-minded young man, raised without much catechesis but seeking to re-discover his Faith, could see that what those Jesuits peddled was not the Catholic Faith he had read about. Thus began a search for authentic Catholicism.

This led through a tortuous path of Mass attendance, first to the now-shuttered Mass at Old St. Mary’s in Washington, D.C., then to a so-called “independent priest,” and eventually to the Society of St. Pius X. But later experience, especially as a priest, has shown that there was a separate path for this young man (parallel to that of many others) which, nearly 25 years later, is recognized as a path of tortuous doctrinal, historical, and spiritual formation. That path is the subject of this article.

The Neophyte and the Tradophyte

The tortuous path seems common for the “trad-vert,” or so-called “convert” to integral traditional Catholicism. The frequency of similar anecdotes does not prove it to be a universal phenomenon, but it is certainly a frequent one. It also seems to mirror the journey of the neophyte—the new convert—for most who do come to the practice of integral Catholicism, neophyte or tradophyte, instantly begin to realize they were missing out on much.

The neophyte often feels like a spiritual child, freshly washed with the Baptismal waters. Unlike neophytes, however, tradophytes do not begin with nothing. They bring at least a partial (often flawed) knowledge of the Catholic Faith along with their previous Sacramental and spiritual practices. They also bear with these a particular difficulty. It is like the man who learned French but has not spoken or used it for many years—it is difficult to go back to basics when you already know some of the basics. It is easier to pretend one is more advanced or mature in the Faith than he actually is, leading to a host of problems. To try to impress a fluent French speaker could be an embarrassment. To try to operate off a flawed view of one’s knowledge and practice of the Faith, lacking humility, can be more disastrous.

St. Paul already warned the Hebrews—Jews and converts who had some taste of the true religion—that “whereas by this time you ought to be masters, you have need to be taught again what are the first elements of the words of God: and you are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat.”¹

Like the neophyte, even once convinced of his lack of knowledge, seeing the mountain of knowledge to be gained, the tradophyte frequently lacks a clear, systematic path forward. The path is one over a glacier filled with hidden crevasses. Chief amongst these is a prideful desire to skip important necessary steps. Real growth takes time and effort, mistakes and remedies. Flowing from this is also a curious Gnostic spirit, especially when one has thought himself “duped” by the modern Church in which he grew up. Attached to this can follow a tendency to search after fantastical and esoteric apparitions, documents, revelations, or supposed conspiracies. From this flows a spiritual malady which could be termed “New Trad Syndrome.”

The Church has long known that these kind of problems plague the neophyte.

The First Council of Nicaea established many disciplinary laws to help unify the Church. Amongst the canons is one that requires catechumens to wait and be tested in their Faith before being admitted to the Baptism.

In the same vein, though, the Council Fathers further required that after Baptism an even greater trial was needed before the neophyte could enter into religious life or to Holy Orders.² This sage advice was already given by St. Paul who warned St. Timothy that any bishop he should ordain should “not [be] a neophyte, lest being puffed up with pride, he fall into the judgment of the devil.”³

The neophyte and tradophyte are both children in the Faith. At the same time, however, such “converts” are often adults. This can present the problem of the adolescent—the half child-half man hybrid, childishly wanting to act as an adult without the concomitant responsibilities and necessary wisdom. This is a tendency of fallen nature, so we are reminded by Our Lord of the need to become as little children, and by many good spiritual authors as well:

[I]f we do not truly convert ourselves and become as children in simplicity and innocence, so that we may be docile to the voice of Truth; if we do not have a true hunger and thirst for justice, as newborn babes desiring the rational milk in order to grow unto salvation in Jesus Christ and to grow until the stature of the perfect man; if, finally, we do not take up the cross of Jesus and learn of Him meekness and humility, we shall never succeed in entering by the narrow gate of the mystical kingdom of God which is within us nor shall we ever find rest for our souls.⁴

The failure at embodying the humility and docility of the “little child” and trying to search too high, too fast, shortcuts a life-long process of transformation by grace, such that Fr. Arnitero could write, “[i]f, then, we have not yet had the good fortune to find the hidden treasure, let us not place the blame on anyone but rather on our own listlessness in searching for that treasure.”⁵

One is listless when he does not have a clear direction and purpose. Finally reaching what seems to be integral Catholicism, whether as a neophyte or tradophyte, the journey seems over, but in fact it is just beginning, and is appreciably more tedious and the direction and purpose less clear. The new traditional Catholic, like the neophyte, can find his zeal zapped after a short time.

This is especially true if fault-finding is the driving force behind the journey into Tradland. The discovery of faults in mainstream Catholicism and the Novus Ordo Missæ can land the tradophyte amongst the so-called “indult” groups. Unsatisfied because more fault is found, such persons move then towards the positions of the Society of St. Pius X. Since our little lifeboat is no utopia, not infrequently does the tradophyte end up in any manner of other more extreme groups like the Resistance or Sedevacantists. Finding these imperfect, one might be led to simply stay at home and await the Second Coming.

On the other hand, the mature Catholic, who has become like a little child, wise enough to have learned that there is no utopia, will discover that the fight is not one firstly against heretics and Modernists, but a combat against self. By this combat against self, and growth in virtue, and a solid spiritual life, one becomes the best possible weapon against heresy, error, and Modernism.

Childhood and Maturity

Writing about actual children and family life, what Fr. Yves le Roux says in a 2011 Rector’s Letter could easily be applied to a spiritual child who “must be taught that life is a combat against self; that this combat, however hard, is the key to his happiness; that the spirit of sacrifice is an elevation of the soul; that details should not be neglected because they are the subject in which the virtues are incarnated.”⁶

Acquired virtue takes time to build, and effort. Focusing on details takes introspection, reflection, and a refined art. Chopping down a tree and finish carpentry are both working with wood, but only the latter is woodworking.

In the Providence of God, this is one major reason why man, amongst so many other animals, requires a quarter-century to reach full maturity, even on a physical level, and needs the dutiful care of parents for over 15 years. A rational animal, he also does not merely physically develop, but must develop his intellect and will, which is an even greater combat. And yet,

acquired moral virtues, useful as they may be, could be continually developed without ever attaining the formal object of the Christian virtues. An infinite difference exists between Aristotelian temperance, governed solely by right reason, and Christian temperance, ruled by divine faith and supernatural prudence.⁷

The new Catholic or new traditional Catholic is beginning his spiritual life, which is ultimately a life of growth towards perfection by supernatural virtue. Because supernatural, it is not merely a matter of personal strength and efforts, and easy for beginner to mistake the correct manner of fighting.

For example, Freemasonry has been a long-standing enemy of the Church, and certainly both its false principles and its members infiltrated society and the Church to effect their evil ends. Nevertheless, it is common that the traditional Catholic, especially the new traditional Catholic, thinks he must learn about all of the details of these enemies, and study their conspiracies against the Bride of Christ.

Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange would say this neglects the use of proper weapons in such a fight. “Whenever some major and deeply entrenched evil,” he writes, “such as freemasonry and its effects must be fought, whenever evil manifests itself as truly satanic, then to appease God’s justice spiritual action no less profound must come forward.”⁸ Under the aegis of Mary, he argues, however, that the real fight is that “[e]very apostle, even every fervent soul within the Church militant, should take some part in the contemplative life and its struggle, making a renewed offering of self daily at Holy Mass.”⁹ In other words, the easy mistake of the beginner is to forget that “our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; but against principalities and powers,”¹⁰ and neglect to see that asceticism and contemplation are far better weapons that social media or political action. Such diminution of the importance of the spiritual life, and emphasis on a feverish naturalistic activity in the name of the Faith is particularly problematic for Americans, as noted by Leo XIII objecting to an

over-esteem of natural virtue [which] finds a method of expression in assuming to divide all virtues in active and passive, and it is alleged that whereas passive virtues found better place in past times, our age is to be characterized by the active…From this disregard of the angelical virtues, erroneously styled passive, the step was a short one to a contempt of the religious life.¹¹

Arguing at the Second Vatican Council not to further reduce the Breviary obligations for priests, Fr. Henri de Lubac summarized Cardinal William Godfrey’s comments in a way applicable to all the faithful, but particularly the neophyte and tradophyte: “Be careful of the hæresis bonorum operum [heresy of good works]; Work must be subordinate to prayer.”¹²

This name “the heresy of good works” was coined by Dom Jean-Baptiste Chautard, O.C.S.O. who wrote the Soul of the Apostolate, to promote a return to the primacy of prayer and contemplation as a foundation for active works. That such a focus first on prayer and a good spiritual life would be an antidote and effective weapon against satanic enemies one needs only read what Dr. Peter Kwasniewski writes about the hidden fight that set itself up at the time of the Second Vatican Council:

[B]y the time of the meeting of the Second Vatican Council in 1962, the battle lines were fairly well drawn up between those who, in accord with Catholic tradition as enunciated by Chautard, saw the inherent priority of prayer and contemplation over works of the active life, and those who, following the modern trend from [Bishop John] Ireland to [Fr. Marie-Dominique] Chenu, wished to lessen the “burden” of prayer in favor of pastoral efficiency. There is no doubt about which side won in practice: all of the liturgies of the Roman Catholic Church, from the sacramental rites to the Divine Office to the blessings, were greatly shortened, simplified, and streamlined; the people were given much to “do,” and the celebrant was given the more “active” roles of interlocutor, animator, commentator, improviser. Religious life was redefined in terms of social apostolate. Contemplatives, in particular, felt they had to justify their existence by pointing to concrete benefits they conferred on society.¹³

And so, the place for the beginner, neophyte or tradophyte, to begin, is at the beginning of the “Way of Perfection” with a focus on developing a good Catholic spiritual life based on perennial principles.

Treatments

Archbishop Lefebvre frequently spoke of an axiom that his seminary professor, Fr. Henri Le Floch, mentioned: “pietas cum doctrina, doctrina cum pietate”—piety with doctrine, doctrine with piety. Lacking solid doctrine, the pious souls can venture quickly into emotionalistic and heretical thinking and praxis. On the other hand, the doctrinal scholar, without piety, is a mere academic, and Faith is not a gnostic endeavor.

According to all reputable spiritual authors “there are always two fundamentals to the Christian life: the aspect of penance, of detestation of sin, of tearing from sin; and the aspect of desire for God, of love for God.”¹⁴ As Archbishop Lefebvre continues, this involves a struggle against our dominant faults (and thus also the growth in the opposing virtues), and a conversion undertaken by the working of Charity, because, “we are not seeking the battle against sin just for the sake of the battle against sin; [w]e are seeking penance in order to finally attain true charity towards God and towards our neighbor.”¹⁵

Even if washed clean by the waters of Baptism as an adult, the neophyte must still be separated from those creatures which hold him back from God. Even more for the tradophyte is this true, for he comes with a cadre of personal sins since his Baptism. This beginning is often called the “Purgative Way” for it is about rooting out the weeds, or purgation of our vices. This separation is painful, and requires real penance, the best of which is the faithful performance of our daily duties with a pure intention, principally directed towards the glory of God.

The Venerable Mary of Agreda explains the uselessness of trying to seek higher steps if the first steps are not taken: “[i]f creatures would cease to occupy themselves with worldly interests and loves, they would, through the inestimable gifts of the Holy Ghost share without limit in the torrents of the Divinity.”¹⁶

Further, experience shows that most of the attacks of the devil are warded off not by “deliverance prayers” or an effort to exorcise some “generational spirit,” but merely by a consistent and devout spiritual life, focusing on the Mass, Rosary, Penance, Meditation, and Spiritual Reading. Noted ascetical theologian, Fr. Antonio Royo-Marin, explains that the attacks of the devil typically only exceed mere temptation “in souls that are far advanced in virtue” and the spiritual life.¹⁷ Further, “it is a fundamental principles advocated by the Church that one may not attribute to the supernatural or preternatural order anything that can probably be explained by purely natural causes.”¹⁸

Practical Measures

Practically, then, what should the spiritual life of a neophyte or tradophyte look like to avoid New Trad Syndrome?

1. Regular attendance at the traditional Mass every Sunday (unless it is not offered every Sunday). If possible, attendance at least once more per week, if not daily, provided our duty of state allows it. The Cross, and therefore the Mass, is the source of all grace, and if the traditional Sacrifice of the Mass is neglected, progress in the spiritual life will stagnate or atrophy.
2. Meditation on at least 5 decades of the Rosary each day. It is not enough to merely recite 6 Our Fathers, 153 Hail Marys, and the rest of the words, but it is necessary to dispose oneself to receive from the mysteries by contemplation or meditation. Once the words are habitual, the mind can be employed to paint the picture of what the mystery contains, and spend the decade considering these scenes, and asking God for light to understand them and receive from them spiritual fruit. Where possible, meditation on all 15 mysteries would be excellent.
3. Regular Confession. The Sacrament of Penance is a kind of CPR for the soul whose life has been snatched away by the wound of mortal sin. It is more than this, though. Since men are not meant to commit mortal sin, the Sacrament also exists as a medicinal remedy for sin, and as a prophylactic treatment to help prevent sin. Confessing every fortnight or month, even without mortal sins on one’s soul, can help apply the sacramental graces of Penance in a way to help grow.
4. A general examination of conscience every day. If a man is to know which way to go and which to avoid, he needs a strategy, and to be able to see how effective such a strategy is, in practice. Thus at the end of each day, to take stock of the failures and successes is critical. The successes where one has cooperated with God’s grace should be the subject of thanksgiving to God for His graces to be faithful. The failures or sins should be put into the arms of God’s Mercy, with an act of contrition, and resolution to try better the next day. Practically, as well, this provides an easy way to prepare one’s confession, by revising the past week’s general examinations.
5. Spiritual Reading. The classical spiritual works as well as biographies of Saints, or lighter religious reading which leads to meditation and contemplation provides the “food for thought.” Reading about various conspiracies, history, or unapproved apparitions is most certainly not good spiritual reading. One should start with classical authors such as St. Francis de Sales, or several mentioned above in this article. While any reading is good, 10–15 minutes is recommended as a beginning. One should also restrict themselves to actual spiritual reading which the Church has given its normal approbation, and avoid fanciful works of dubious value and approval (e.g., various so-called prophecies or visions such as those of Maria Valtorta).
6. Meditation. Words like “meditation” and “contemplation” may seem to indicate something only religious or mystics could accomplish, and not the average Christian, but spiritual authors assert that even the average Christian is meant to reach the highest recesses of infused contemplation in this life. Further, “contemplation” and “meditation” are not so esoteric as they may seem, but begin by simply quietly, in prayer, thinking about certain aspects of God, the mysteries of the Faith, or what we have gleaned from our reading, the Mass, the Rosary, or our previous exercises of mental prayer. Again, even 5–10 minutes provides great benefit, but 15 minutes is ideal.

One will notice that amongst these recommendations, active works are not mentioned. These are not forbidden, but as said above, must be secondary, and flow from a good spiritual life.

The excitement of finding the integral Catholic Faith, or of receiving baptism being over, one can easily feel listless because the most dramatic visible changes have taken place, revealing a grueling and seemingly boring struggle from day to day. Avoiding the temptation to invent or discover the shiny distractions that abound, and instead, doing this hard daily work, will preserve one from dangers, and inoculate against New Trad Syndrome.

Endnotes

¹ Heb. 5.12.

² Conc. Nicaenum I, can. 2. (From Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, vol. 14. Trans. Percival, Henry. Ed. Schaff, Philip and Wace, Henry. (1900) Christian Literature Publishing Co.)

³ I Tim 3.6.

⁴ John Arintero, The Mystical Evolution in the Development of and Vitality of the Church, trans. Jordan Aumann (Herder, 1951) II, p. 412.

⁵ Ibid.

⁶ Yves le Roux, Letter to Friends and Benefactors (June 2011), St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary, Winona, MN.

⁷ Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Christian Perfection and Contemplation, Ch. 3, art. 2.

⁸ Garrigou-Lagrange, The Love of God and the Cross of Jesus. Vol. 2, pg. 408.

⁹ Ibid.

¹⁰ Eph. 6:12.

¹¹ Cf. Leo XIII, Testem benevolentiae nostræ (Jan. 22, 1899).

¹² Henri de Lubac, Vatican Council Notebooks, 1:258–59.

¹³ Peter Kwasniewski, “Confronting the Heresy of Activism with the Primacy of Prayer,” New Liturgical Movement (Nov. 20, 2017).

¹⁴ Marcel Lefebvre, Marcel, The Spiritual Life, p. 204.

¹⁵ Ibid., p. 205.

¹⁶ Ven. Mary of Agreda, Mystical City of God, Pt. I, Bk. II, ch. 13.

17 Royo-Marín, Antonio. The Theology of Christian Perfection. (1962) Priory Press. p. 247.

18 Ibid., p. 248.