The following essay by Wolfram Schrems (M.A. in Theology, M.A. in Philosophy), a catechist and pro-life advocate in Vienna, takes issue with the suppression of the Old Mass and the discrimination against traditional believers by the Vatican and bishops, with reference to Peter Kwasniewski’s work The Once and Future Roman Rite: Returning to the Traditional Latin Liturgy after Seventy Years of Exile (TAN Books, 2022) of which he is reviewing the German edition, Der alte und künftige Römische Ritus—Die Rückkehr der traditionellen lateinischen Messe nach 70 Jahren des Exils (St. Stephani Verlags, 2023). The original German of the review may be found here.
Since the promulgation of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum in the summer of 2007, interest in the Latin Mass has risen sharply, especially among young people. Since the Society of St. Pius X did not participate—or, depending on the region, only partially participated—in the shameful actions of the official Church structures during the COVID-19 response from 2020 to 2022, an even larger number of faithful found their way back to the traditional Mass and the faith handed down through the ages. Since the tyrannical measures imposed by Pope Francis and his henchmen in 2021 and thereafter (Traditionis Custodes and Responsa ad dubia), many—not just Catholics, by the way—have been asking themselves why this hatred of tradition exists precisely within the hierarchy.
Against this dark and confusing backdrop, Peter Kwasniewski’s book The Once and Future Roman Rite: Returning to the Traditional Latin Liturgy after Seventy Years of Exile, now in German (joining the Italian and Spanish editions), shines all the brighter: faith, piety, scholarship, literary talent, and wit distinguish this highly readable and groundbreaking work. To put it plainly: it deserves the widest possible circulation among laypeople, university theologians, priests, and bishops. It would also be a worthwhile read for non-Catholics who are searching or considering conversion and have some prior knowledge.
The Author and His Development
The Thomist philosopher Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, born in Chicago in 1971, worked from 1998 to 2006 at the International Theological Institute and the Austrian Program of Franciscan University of Steubenville, both then located in Gaming, Lower Austria, and subsequently joined the founding team of Wyoming Catholic College, where he held leadership and teaching positions until 2018.
As a choir director, Kwasniewski was inevitably confronted with liturgical issues; moreover, the strong Greek Catholic presence in Gaming at the time demonstrated an approach to the liturgy entirely different from that of the Novus Ordo Missae (NOM). He became increasingly engaged with questions surrounding the traditional Mass and followed the expected and logical path, from the “reform of the reform” through “mutual enrichment” to the final rejection of the NOM in favor of restorationism. Since then, he has produced one high-quality publication after another. On Passion Sunday 2017, he presented the German translation of his book Resurgent in the Midst of Crisis (Neuanfang inmitten der Krise) during a study afternoon in Vienna.
He runs the publishing house Os Justi Press (though his own works are not published there) and plays a leading role in the blog Rorate Coeli, among other projects. In the English-speaking world, he is one of the leading authors defending the traditional liturgy and offering scathing criticism of the Novus Ordo. His circle is the New Liturgical Movement (NLM), in which priests and laypeople advocate for a renewal of the traditional liturgy.
He is married and has a son and a daughter. He therefore knows from personal experience the effects of the liturgy and its variations on family life. Kwasniewski attends Holy Mass at an oratory of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter and is also familiar with the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest. According to his own statements, he views the Priestly Society of St. Pius X with goodwill but also some reservations.
The Traditional and the Artificially Created “New” Liturgy
The book contains twelve chapters based on earlier publications and lectures, which have been thoroughly revised. In an appendix, Kwasniewski documents programmatic statements by Pope Paul VI on liturgical reform and provides an extensive bibliography.
(4) In the 20th century, a certain liturgical “tinkeritis” or mentality of tinkering emerges. This differs from the legitimate concerns of the original Liturgical Movement.
Kwasniewski criticizes the significant intervention in the Holy Week liturgy by Pope Pius XII (1955), who was already collaborating with Annibale Bugnini. In 1960, an unnecessary reform of the rubrics took place. In 1962, a new, reformed Missal was introduced, in which the name of St. Joseph was inserted into the Canon—which had been treated as immutable until then—apparently a deliberately created precedent for further revolutionary measures. In 1965, a reformed Missal was promulgated; four years later, a completely new, artificially cobbled-together rite was imposed. Kwasniewski compares it to the constructed language Esperanto. “Difficult” scriptural passages, such as those from the psalms of cursing, no longer appear in the unfortunate new lectionary and divine office; the Pauline warning against unworthy reception of Communion has been completely deleted. Only thirteen percent of the traditional orations are retained in the NOM; all other prayers are deleted or watered down.
Church authorities also decreed massive interventions in the liturgical calendar and changes to the other sacraments. The Traditional Rite is de facto banned, a novelty in Church history: Kwasniewski cites St. John Henry Newman saying that the Church has “never completely removed from public worship any ceremony, object, or prayer that once had a place in that worship.”
Limits of Papal Authority and Papal Errors
In creating the NOM, Pope Paul VI may have acted ultra vires—that is, beyond his authority—according to authorities cited approvingly by Kwasniewski. The NOM is also no longer the Roman Rite and does not “express the fullness of our faith…either in its texts or in its ceremonies.” Kwasniewski further disputes that the NOM was based on “the express will of the Council,” as Paul VI claimed.
Even if Kwasniewski does not fundamentally dispute the “validity” of the NOM, the liturgy is naturally about more than the minimalism of “validity,” namely about fruitfulness, the representation of the full faith, the actualization of the mystery, the formation of the believer’s personality, and its culture-shaping power: “Lex orandi—lex credendi—lex vivendi,” as Kwasniewski recalls in several places.
The discovery of the Old Mass was a personal turning point for him: “Finding this liturgy and surrendering to it was the end of a search I didn’t even know I had begun.”
Kwasniewski no longer dwells on the “reform of the reform” and “mutual enrichment” (less than a decade ago, by his own account, he still saw things differently). For him, the only sensible way forward is a return to the classical liturgy of the West, as it existed before the arbitrary and mechanical interventions of 1955. (Whether he wishes to reverse Pius XII’s 1951 decision to move the Easter Vigil to the evening is not clear from the book. In his highly readable foreword, Martin Mosebach makes it clear that, for him at least, the shift to the evening was a sensible reform.)
The NOM stems from a revolution and perpetuates it: “The Novus Ordo (in the words of Consilium member Joseph Gelineau) was conceived as a ‘permanent workshop.’” That a pope favored such a process indicates a serious crisis of the papacy. Liturgy must—as Kwasniewski repeatedly emphasizes—lead to the love of God, adoration, and a spirit of sacrifice, not to tinkering.
Kwasniewski sharply criticizes Pope Francis’s accompanying letter to Traditionis Custodes, in which the Pope wrote that the NOM is a rite “in which the great richness of the Roman liturgical tradition is preserved”: “In my opinion, such statements are among the worst lies ever found in a papal document.”
Despite the spirit of “narcissism, dryness, and boredom” and despite “an astonishing lack of fruitfulness and an alarming absence of vocations to the priesthood and religious life in relation to the number and needs of Catholics” (175), the hierarchy clings fanatically to the NOM.
At one point, Kwasniewski clearly makes a discernment of spirits: “If the Lord wills that the Church endure in this world, then a time must come when Tradition is vindicated and the project of modernization is exposed as the satanic trick it has always been.”
Kwasniewski’s observation that the Church hierarchy—paradoxically enough—completely ignored the 50th anniversary of the promulgation of Paul VI’s Missal in 2019 and deliberately did not celebrate it is very interesting. There was a cunning reason for this silence: “There is to be no further acknowledgment that the ‘Novus Ordo’ exists at all. There is to be only ‘the Mass,’ period. The fact that changes were ever made to the liturgy is to slip deeper into the abyss of memory with each passing year”—not that this is really possible anymore, thanks to the internet!
Summary
It is astonishing that Kwasniewski never becomes boring: after all, there are over 380 densely printed pages [the English edition has more pages but less text per page—Ed.], so a considerable amount of material. Everything is interesting and relevant and leads to numerous “aha moments.”
Kwasniewski can be sharp in his phrasing—and also humorous; he coined one or two neologisms (“in vitro transubstantiation” in a loveless new liturgy, 162; “anti-occidents,” i.e., anti-Western resentments, 290) and comments on the arbitrariness and chaos of the Novus Ordo Missae in a variation on Heraclitus’ famous dictum: “One cannot step into the same Novus Ordo twice” (140).
No serious reevaluation of the NOM and no meaningful liturgical scholarship whatsoever can ignore Kwasniewski’s critique. New standards are set here.
What may come as a surprise is the author’s positive assessment of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. The message of St. Faustina Kowalska, canonized by John Paul II, is normally viewed critically or negatively within traditionalist circles. Yet Kwasniewski understands this private revelation as a compensatory measure of Divine Providence in view of the decline in the sacrificial character of the Mass, which at that time lay only about thirty years in the future (190, fn. 110). In this, he demonstrates his intellectual breadth.
As a—mild—criticism, the reviewer must point out that Kwasniewski is too uncritical of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI. He quotes statements from both popes that deserve approval, but fails to ask the obvious question: Why, then, did they not exercise their authority to a greater extent in favor of the faith and tradition, including in the sphere of the liturgy? Kwasniewski could also have more strongly highlighted the sinister, negative, even diabolical nature of the battle against the Mass of All Time. As is well known, Archbishop Bugnini pushed through his agenda by means of lies. Kwasniewski writes that Archbishop Bugnini was “banished [to Tehran] for scheming.” He could have mentioned that—according to conventional historiography—evidence of Bugnini’s membership in Freemasonry had been presented to Paul VI.
All of these are, of course, minor points in a magnificent work. Thanks and appreciation to the author and also to the publisher. May the book spread widely, for the good of souls.
• The Once and Future Roman Rite [original English ed.]
from TAN | from Os Justi | from Amazon
• El Rito Romano de Ayer y del Futuro [Spanish ed.]
from Amazon.es or any other Amazon site
• Il Rito Romano di Ieri e di Domani [Italian ed.]
from Amazon.it or any other Amazon site
• Der alte und künftige Römische Ritus [German ed.]
from St. Stefani Verlag
