by Kevin Tierneyfor Rorate Cæli
Following Diane Montagna’s bombshell revelation of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's summary of the Bishops opinion on Summorum Pontificum, it was wondered by many how the defenders of Traditionis custodes would respond. While the first 24 hours saw a flurry of defenses call into question her reporting (none of them very compelling), defenders have received their talking points and have settled upon a defense. What they do not realize is this defense puts them into an even more precarious position.
As a quick refresher, Montagna was given what could be described as an executive summary of the bishops’ responses to a 2020 consultation of the worlds Bishops by the then Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith about how Summorum Pontificum (which liberalized the Latin Mass) had played out in their dioceses. The executive summary revealed that most Bishops were happy, overall, with how it had played out in their dioceses, that opposition to Summorum Pontificum was a minority position among the bishops, and that the overarching theme of the bishops’ advice was to leave the decree alone. Francis instead issued Traditionis custodes, saying in the accompanying letter that it was based on “your [the bishops'] requests” and mentioning the results of the survey troubling him, forcing him to act.
In a press conference on Thursday, Matteo Bruni (spokesman for the Holy See Press Office) said that while he could not comment on the authenticity on the actual document Montagna had in her hands, he chastised her for painting an incomplete picture. You see, when Francis said, “your requests,” what he was troubled by were not just the words in the survey, but also “other documentation and other reports received and internal consultations that the Dicastery of the Doctrine of the Faith received.”
Based on this, the standard talking point going out is that the Pope was neither deceptive nor lying when he said that he had received “requests”, and that nobody should have limited that to the survey!
To even offer such a defense is evidence of what a precarious position you find yourself in. Such wordsmithing can be easily sidestepped with a simple question: did a majority of Bishops favor action that would become Traditionis custodes?
The answer is clear: the executive summary of the survey painted this as a minority opinion. At the time this was obvious. There are those who attempt to say that the French Bishops leaked responses in 2021 showed that they favored what would become Traditionis custodes. Yet the remedies proposed are things like having everyone used a shared calendar or shared readings, not forcing everyone worshipping at the Latin Mass to eventually abandon it. (Something they are forced to concede when questioned directly.) The Vice President of the French Bishops conference publicly noted that the “harshness” of the popes decree surprised him. Since they cannot be reliably counted in the corner of what would become Traditionis custodes, there does not seem to be a reason to doubt the executive summary’s assessment that the position that would become Traditionis custodes was that of a minority.
The only defense the TC defenders are left with is that the Pope does not need to listen to any advice he receives; he is completely free to do whatever he wants. In this they are correct, but there are consequences to such freedom. To see this, let us engage in a thought exercise: what if, in the accompanying letter for Traditionis custodes, the Pope stated that what he was considering was a position most bishops did not hold, but that he nonetheless felt compelled to take? He wouldn’t include that because it would obviously sabotage the effectiveness of the decree, by pointing out that a majority were opposed. It is why the spin for a long time was that a majority did in fact support it, going off of the Pope’s own framing of the matter.
A comparison to the commission Paul VI convened to discuss birth control does not prove what they think it does. A reasonable case could be made that while a majority of the commission favored changing Church teaching on birth control, a majority of the world's bishops at the time did not favor changing it. Here, in 2020, we have reasonable grounds to believe a majority of the world's bishops opposed Traditionis custodes -- and still do. How long, as Pope, do you keep a discipline in place that most of your fellow bishops oppose?
You might keep it in place if you presume it is going to become more popular over time, but can you reasonably assume that? The full report is almost certainly going to leak. The person most responsible for its promulgation is no longer alive, and one of its key intellectual defenders (Andrea Grillo) now finds himself out of favor with current authorities. The defenders' new position will be one of having to continually defend that minority position and of having to persuade the Holy Father that something unpopular and divisive is necessary to keep in place, and that he should stay the course. That is likely not a sustainable position, and they know it.
It is unknowable what the immediate future holds for Traditionis custodes, but its reckoning is approaching. It is simply a question of when, not if.
