The Rebel Bishops
"ROMANUS EPISCOPUS NON HABET IURISDICTIONEM"
An excerpt from "Communion Under Both Kinds"
by Michael Davies
|
The Angelus Press will shortly publish a revised and considerably expanded version of Michael Davies' pamphlet "Communion Under Both Kinds." This revision has been made necessary because when first published in March 1980 it was able to refer to the practice of distributing Holy Communion under both kinds at Sunday Masses in the U.S.A. as illicit. The practice was prohibited by the Holy See, but the American Bishops decided to defy the Pope. Although the practice must still be regarded as reprehensible within the Roman Rite it is no longer illicit. On 13 October 1984 the Holy See surrendered to the episcopal rebels of the United States, and authorized the distribution of Holy Communion under both kinds at Sunday Masses. This was a repetition of the abject surrender made by the Holy See on the question of Communion in the hand. In 1985 the United States Catholic Conference published a booklet entitled "This Holy and Living Sacrifice", to promote the practice of Communion under both kinds. The booklet attempted to cover up the fact that the Holy See had surrendered to a rebellion of the American Bishops. It referred to this surrender simply as a "confirmation" of the decision of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops "to extend Communion under both kinds to Sundays and holy days of obligation." The liturgical establishment is not satisfied with total victory in its anti-papal rebellion. It wishes the faithful to believe that no rebellion took place. In a statement accompanying the Bishops' publication, Father Joseph S. McMahon, Director of the Office of Worship of the Archdiocese of Portland, referred indignantly to journals and individuals who had gone so far as to accuse "Bishops of disloyalty if not defiance of papal authority." Father McMahon wishes to "challenge those who mischievously fabricated a scenario of defiance and failure of reverence of community within the Church." The truth is that this scenario is factual and not fabricated. The disloyal American Bishops did defy papal authority. The story of this squalid but successful rebellion will be fully documented in the expanded and revised edition of "Communion Under Both Kinds." Catholics who believe that truth matters will spare no effort or expense in distributing it as widely as possible to counteract the episcopal cover-up campaign. The pamphlet will also provide them with all the facts they need to prove that it is the duty of faithful Catholics of the Roman Rite to uphold the traditional practice of Communion under one kind only for the laity. We are publishing an extract from the pamphlet in this issue of The Angelus. References for all the documentation it includes will be provided in the pamphlet. |
At the pressing request of King Henry VIII, sixty-six bishops and other high ecclesiastics signed the Act of Supremacy which stated: "The Bishop of Rome hath not any greater jurisdiction granted him by God in sacred scripture in this realm of England than hath any other bishop." While one cannot condone their action, one can at least understand it in view of the fate which befell St. John Fisher, the Bishop of Rochester, who refused to sign.
At the November 1978 meeting of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops of the U.S.A., the same message was sent to the Holy See: "The Bishop of Rome hath not any jurisdiction in this Republic—Episcopus Romanus not habet iurisdictionem in hac republica." They did not express themselves quite so bluntly, but the message which they sent to the Pope was perfectly clear. The Bishops of the United States would only comply with papal legislation which met with their approval. If they did not approve of what the Pope commanded they would legislate for themselves. Visitors to the Protestant areas of Belfast will see the following slogan painted in large letters of numerous walls: "To hell with the Pope." There could be no more appropriate slogan for display at meetings of the U.S.C.C.B. In an editorial in the January 1983 issue of The Homiletic and Pastoral Review, its courageous and respected editor, Father Kenneth Baker, S.J., noted that in the United States: "We are witnessing the rejection of the hierarchical Church founded by Jesus Christ to be replaced by a Protestant American Church separate from Rome." The decision of the American Bishops at their 1978 November meeting to defy Rome in the matter of Communion under both kinds is just one of may instances which could be cited to prove the truth of Father Baker's allegation. It is particularly appropriate example as the practice has, since the sixteenth century, been considered in the west as specifically Protestant. The imposition of Communion under both kinds was the first step taken by Thomas Cranmer in his campaign to destroy the faith of English Catholics by means of liturgical innovation.
Chronology of a Rebellion
Article 55 of the Liturgy Constitution of the Second Vatican Council specified only three instances where Communion under both kinds might be introduced as an option within the Roman Rite. This list was expanded to fourteen in the General Instruction which appeared at the beginning of the New Missal published in 1970. Some episcopal conferences requested permission to expand the list still further, a request which the Holy See conceded, but within strictly defined limits. These limits were set out in the Instruction Sacramentali Communione of 29 June 1970. The relevant paragraphs read as follows:
1. Communion under both kinds may be distributed in accordance with the judgment of the ordinary (diocesan bishop) in cases determined by the Holy See—as given in the list adjoining this Instruction.
2. Moreover, the episcopal conferences may decide for themselves, for what motives and in what conditions, ordinaries may concede Communion under both kinds in other cases which have great importance for the spiritual life of a particular community or group of faithful.
3. Within these limits, the ordinaries may indicate particular cases. This is on condition, however, that the faculty should not be conceded indiscriminately, and that the celebration should be clearly indicated, together with those points to which particular attention must be paid. This faculty should not be granted on occasions where there are large groups of communicants. The groups to whom the faculty is conceded should be adequately instructed on the significance of the rite.
It is evident that by no possible stretch of the imagination could these instructions be interpreted as authorizing the entire congregation at any Mass, including the large numbers of communicants present at Sunday Masses to receive Communion under both kinds. It is worth repeating the key points of these restrictions:
(a) The faculty can only be conceded for particular occasions to a particular group.
(b) It can never be conceded indiscriminately or on occasions when there are a large number of communicants.
Yet, at their November 1978 meeting, the American Bishops had the effrontery to claim that they could remain within these norms and authorize every communicant to receive Communion under both kinds at Sunday and holy day Masses where there are large number of communicants. They stated:
The change requires no action from the Vatican, which in 1970 gave local episcopal conferences permission to choose appropriate circumstances beyond the fourteen occasions already listed in the General Instructions of the Roman Missal.
The Vatican did indeed give this permission, but strictly within the limits of the three conditions which have been cited. The extent to which permitting the practice on Sundays and holy days violated the Vatican legislation was apparent to many of the bishops. This was made clear by the fact that the necessary two-thirds majority was achieved by only one vote after polling bishops not present at the meeting. The same procedure had been adopted to legalize the abuse of Communion in the hand. The Auxiliary-Bishop of Los Angeles, John Ward, stated that he opposed the introduction of Communion under both kinds because there was "a liturgical revolt brewing among his people who were fed up with a continuous stream of changes." But other bishops had already introduced the practice as a personal act of defiance before the November 1978 Meeting. Bishop Walter Curtiss of Bridgeport explained without a trace of embarrassment how it was already working well at Sunday Masses in one large parish in his diocese.
Ecumenical zealots in the U.S.A. made no attempt to conceal their delight at the episcopal rebellion. A report in the St. Paul Pioneer Press of 15 December 1978 quoted the Archdiocesan Liturgical Director, Father James Notebaart, as declaring: "In theology two things have happened. We've returned to our roots and we've come into more acceptable relationships with non-Catholic forms of the Eucharist, since many of them received the cup since the sixteenth-century."
The blatant manner in which the American Bishops were defying the Pope was evident to any well informed priest or layman. There was widespread indignation at the innovation, but this was largely excluded from journals under episcopal control, which were replete with articles intended to induce Catholics who were not well informed to accept without complaint this latest ecumenical surrender.
Writing in the 28 December 1978 edition of The Wanderer, the Editor, A.J. Matt, Jr., protested:
So, Bishops, as you score one more for the dissidents, have a little sympathy for those Catholics who remember the words of St. Peter Canisius, the great theologian of Trent, who during a debate on this very issue, declared that it was his opinion that "giving the cup to the laity" would be a mistake. "It would," he said, "only tend to confuse the faithful Catholics and encourage the disobedience of the recalcitrant."
During the course of 1979 individual bishops made inquiries to the Holy See and were informed that the Bishops had exceeded their authority by extending the practice of Communion under both kinds to Sundays and holy days without the approval of the Vatican. The hierarchy was informed of this at their November 1979 meeting, presumably by Archbishop John Quinn, the NCCB President, acting on information from the Holy See.
One American layman had the excellent idea of writing directly to the Vatican to ask for a ruling on the question of Communion under both kinds at Sunday Masses. A reply was received from Msgr. Virgilio Noé, Associate Secretary of the Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship. It was dated 22 February 1980 and bore the reference: Prot.n. CD 163/80. Msgr. Noé's answer was as follows:
The decision of the Episcopal Conference of the United States to allow Communion of the chalice to be given on every Sunday, has not been confirmed by this Congregation. It is therefore necessary to remain within the limits established by the general Instruction of the Roman Missal (1975 edition), nos. 240-243.
Msgr. Noé could hardly have been more explicit. The cat was well and truly out of the bag. The decision of the American Bishops had not been confirmed by Rome, and it was their duty to remain within the limits established by the Holy See. Knowledge of the letter soon became widespread, and the text was published in such conservative journals as The Wanderer.
I was in Rome at Easter of the same year, having been invited to meet Cardinal Seper, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who had read a number of my books. The rebellion of the American Bishops in the matter of Communion under both kinds was one of the subjects I raised with him as I was due to fly to the U.S.A. a few days later to take part in a debate on the liturgy with Msgr. Joseph Champlin on the William Buckley Firing Line program (telecast on 4 May 1980). I wished to be able to comment on the question with the advantage of knowing the precise position of the Vatican. Cardinal Seper admitted quite frankly that the American Bishops were defying Rome. I asked him why the Holy See was taking no action to discipline them, and he gave me the depressing reply that the Holy See no longer exercised effective control over the American hierarchy. (This is precisely what Father Kenneth Baker claimed in his January 1988 editorial which has already been cited.) "What do you expect us to do?" asked the Cardinal. "We can hardly ask the entire hierarchy to resign!"
I felt bound to concede at the time that this was a strong argument, but a few days later an American priest, to whom I related the conversation, remarked that while this was no doubt true, if three or four of the leading episcopal rebels were asked to resign it would have a dramatic effect upon the others. He was certainly correct. It brought to mind the sad case of the English Admiral Byng who was executed for ineptitude during the Napoleonic wars. A politician wondered why he had been shot when the rest of the admirals were not much better. "Pour encourager les autres," was the reply—To encourage the others." The eventual British triumph indicates that the tactic was successful.
The Holy See removed any possible doubt concerning its position concerning Communion under both kinds when, with the approval of Pope John Paul II, the Instruction Inaestimabile Donum ("The Priceless Gift"), was published on 3 April 1980. It stated the current discipline of the Church in the clearest possible terms:
With regard to Communion under both kinds, the norms laid down by the Church must be observed, both by reason of the reverence due to the Sacrament and for the good of those receiving the Eucharist, in accordance with variations in circumstances, times, and places.
Episcopal conferences and ordinaries are not to go beyond what is laid down in the present discipline: the granting of permission for Communion under both kinds is not to be indiscriminate, and the celebrations in question are to be specified precisely; the groups that use this faculty are to be clearly defined, well disciplined and homogeneous.
The aim of Inaestimabile Donum was to bring an end to the worst abuses accompanying the celebration of the New Mass in many countries. There can be no doubt that No. 12 of the Instruction, which has just been cited, was directed specifically at the American hierarchy, as it was only in the United States that the Vatican norms were being defied on the instructions of the hierarch. In such countries as England, Rome was being defied with the connivance of the Bishops, but not upon their instructions.
The response of the United States hierarchy to Inaestimable Donum was one of contemptuous rejection. It was summarized by Archbishop Bernardin of Cincinnati on 5 June 1980:
In 1978 the bishops of this country, in the light of our favorable experience, voted to permit Communion under both kinds on Sundays. Since then the question has been raised as to whether this particular action went beyond the intent of the conciliar documents. The Conference has agreed to take up the matter with the Holy See. Accordingly, the authorization for Communion under both kinds remains in force unless there is some notification to the contrary in future.
The Archbishop would have been more frank and less verbose had he simply adopted the slogan of the Belfast Orangemen and said: "To hell with the Pope." This is certainly the gist of his response to Inaestimabile Donum. The American Bishops had decided to permit the practice not in accordance with Vatican legislation, but "in the light of favorable experience." Since "the question has been raised" as to whether this particular action was in accordance with "conciliar documents" the American Bishops had graciously agreed to take up the matter with the Holy See. What, in fact, Inaestimabile Donum had stated was that the American bishops had indeed acted ultra vires in authorizing Communion under both kinds at Sunday Masses, and that the practice must cease, i.e., bishops "are not to go beyond what is laid down in the present discipline." Far from complying, Archbishop Bernardin stated that the American Bishops would carry on just as if the Instruction had never been published.
The Vatican Surrenders
The next stage of the conflict between Rome and the United States' hierarchy was as predictable as it was sad. It was a repetition of the abject surrender following defiance of the Holy See on the question of Communion in the hand. The Vatican had accepted, as Cardinal Seper expressed it to me, that it no longer exercised effective control over the American Bishops, and it capitulated in the face of a fait accompli. On 13 October 1984, the Congregation for the Sacraments and Divine Worship informed the National Conference of Catholic Bishops that the Apostolic See had confirmed the Conference decision to extend Communion under both kinds to Sunday and holy days of obligation, if in the judgment of the ordinary, Communion can be given in an orderly and reverent way (reference: Prot. CD 1297/78).
In 1985 the U.S.C.C. published This Holy and Living Sacrifice—Directory for the Celebration and Reception of Communion under Both Kinds. The title is more than somewhat strange as Catholics do not have "celebrations" of Holy Communion. Catholic priests celebrate the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and Protestant ministers celebrate a service of Holy Communion. In order to stress the total and abject capitulation of the Vatican, the Bishops were able to state smugly that the Congregation for Divine Worship had also given its approval for this publication. The booklet has as little respect for truth as the American Bishops have for the Holy See. It states, for example:
There has long been a desire among God's People for the restoration of the ancient practice of Communion under both kinds, not from any wavering or lack of faith or doubt of the Church's teaching. Rather the faithful have yearned that Christ's presence in the Eucharist be more fully expressed in the Rite of Communion under the form of bread and under the form of wine in one liturgical action.
Any layman could inform the bishops how far removed this allegation is from the truth. Before the Bishops decided to impose this practice upon the faithful, in an attempt to curry favor with Protestants, there had not been the least yearning for Communion under both kinds among the faithful. It is unlikely that anyone who is reading this ever heard a desire for the practice expressed by a single Catholic acquaintance. The same can be said for Communion in the hand or Mass in the vernacular. Like the Party in the USSR, the NCCB interprets the will of the people. Thus, when the NCCB wishes to impose yet another Protestantizing innovation upon the faithful it follows, ipso facto, that the faithful have been yearning for it.
The utter contempt felt by the NCCB for the Holy See and for the faithful is manifested most clearly in footnote 52. The Bishops state that they authorized Communion under both kinds on Sundays in accordance with the norms of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal, when in fact their authorization manifestly contradicted these norms. The same footnote adds that this decision was confirmed by the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship on 13 October 1984, without hinting that this was a reluctant surrender by the Holy See following six years of open rebellion.
Current Issue
