Asuntos Tradicionalistas

Misa Dialogada - CLXV

El Partido de Dios reemplazado por el Partido del Pueblo

Dra. Carol Byrne, Gran Bretaña

Como el espacio no permite un tratamiento más amplio del tema, aquí solo se considerarán algunos ejemplos representativos de sacerdotes involucrados en política. Los más destacados entre ellos fueron Don Luigi Sturzo, fundador del Partido Popular Italiano, el P. (más tarde Cardenal) Joseph Cardijn, fundador de la Juventud Obrera Cristiana, el P. Marie-Dominique Chenu, inspirador del Movimiento de los Sacerdotes Obreros, y algunas otras figuras menos conocidas dedicadas a lograr fines revolucionarios similares.

Arriba, el P. Cardijn persuadiendo a jóvenes trabajadores; abajo, el P. Chenu difundiendo el Progresismo

Ellos también pueden describirse mejor como demagogos, en el sentido de que dirigieron campañas y arengaron a multitudes de católicos, predominantemente jóvenes, con el propósito de persuadirlos a participar colectivamente en actividades que serían perjudiciales para las estructuras sociales y económicas de la sociedad occidental.

Un rasgo llamativo de estos sacerdotes –todos ellos destacados animadores de la política revolucionaria radical– es que estaban ideológicamente sesgados hacia la extrema izquierda del espectro político. Era inevitable que sacerdotes de tendencia socialista, como lobos con piel de oveja, utilizaran su autoridad espiritual sobre los fieles para inculcar teorías de izquierda en materia política y económica.

Enseñaban que el Capitalismo de libre mercado era una invención perversa de los pensadores anti-Dios de la Ilustración, especialmente diseñada para explotar a los trabajadores y mantenerlos en la pobreza –ignorando la evidencia histórica de que derivaba su fundamento de las teorías económicas del período de la Alta Escolástica en la Iglesia. Como resultado, generaciones enteras de católicos se formaron la impresión de que no solo el Capitalismo de libre mercado, sino también los capitalistas, debían ser combatidos y vencidos si se quería lograr la “Justicia Social”.

Esta fue la narrativa tóxica en la que se concibió la Acción Católica. Fue un semillero fértil para conflictos internos entre sacerdotes y sus confrères en el ministerio; entre sacerdotes y sus feligreses; entre distintos miembros del laicado que luchaban entre sí sobre qué punto del espectro político debía ocupar la Iglesia; entre asalariados y empleadores, obreros de fábrica e industriales, campesinos y terratenientes.

Fue también el catalizador del movimiento de la Teología de la Liberación, de inspiración marxista, que los Papas del Concilio Vaticano II fueron incapaces de controlar. Y todavía continúa hoy en el movimiento de “Justicia Social” en muchas Diócesis alrededor del mundo. Peor aún, el tema anticapitalista fue incorporado a las encíclicas papales sobre cuestiones sociales desde Juan XXIII hasta León XIV, donde a menudo se disfraza bajo el título genérico de “estructuras de pecado” que los buenos católicos deben combatir.

El sacerdote-político P. Luigi Sturzo (1871-1959)

Desde el momento en que fue ordenado sacerdote, el P. Sturzo llevó adelante una carrera política a tiempo completo, a la cual dedicó toda su vida sacerdotal. Dada la evidencia de su biografía, se podría decir con precisión que vivió y respiró política.

Escribiendo desde su exilio del régimen de Mussolini en 1941, publicó un artículo titulado ‘Mi vocación política: ¿Qué llevó a un sacerdote italiano a la política?’ ¹ En él, se refiere a haber presenciado durante la Pascua de 1895 la pobreza y las penurias que sufrían los habitantes de un barrio obrero de Roma. Fue una experiencia que lo convirtió en un guerrero de clases, un agitador político que dedicaría su vida a la reforma social y económica, con el objetivo de mejorar el bienestar material del pueblo.

El P. Sturzo y miembros del Partido Popular Italiano

Cuando entró en la arena política, asumió el ejercicio del poder civil, convirtiéndose en alcalde de su ciudad natal, Caltagirone, en Sicilia, y fundó el Partido Popular Italiano (PPI) en 1919, basado en principios ampliamente sillonistas. Estos incluían la independencia respecto de la jerarquía, la separación entre Iglesia y Estado, una reforma social y económica radical, una plataforma no confesional, la creencia en la fraternidad universal del hombre a lograrse mediante la Democracia Cristiana, y una alianza con el Partido Socialista. No es de extrañar, entonces, que en vida fuera conocido como un “socialista clerical”, y que ahora sea aclamado como “un profeta para hoy” y “el santo de los gobiernos” por quienes, con una mentalidad similar, piden su canonización.²

El P. Sturzo era hábil para reunir seguidores en torno a su causa, un ejemplo destacado siendo su discurso en la Conferencia de Génova el 30 de abril de 1922. En esa ocasión, se informó que “participó en un discurso público en el que instó a la necesidad de instituir una ‘internacional política’ fundada en los ideales cristianos de amor, fraternidad, tolerancia, equidad y justicia.” ³

En otras palabras, creía en el internacionalismo y el gobierno mundial, sobre la base falsa de que el Estado-Nación individual era una receta para el prejuicio y la guerra, y que solo un compromiso con una Democracia mundial no confesional sería capaz de asegurar una paz permanente. (Eso era exactamente lo que Pío X había condenado con respecto al Sillon).

El P. Luigi Sturzo

Sin embargo, el Papa Pío XI, quien inicialmente permitió al P. Sturzo libertad para operar, aparentemente había subestimado la naturaleza extremista de sus actividades como agitador antigubernamental. Alarmado por las amenazas de represalias estatales contra la Iglesia, el Papa lo obligó a renunciar como Secretario del Partido en 1923 y le ordenó exiliarse. ⁴ En febrero de 1924, renovó la prohibición de que los sacerdotes pertenecieran a partidos políticos, condenó personal y públicamente la idea del P. Sturzo de una coalición del PPI con los socialistas, ⁵ y el Partido fue disuelto en 1926.

Pero eso no fue el final de la inusual carrera del P. Sturzo. Viajó extensamente por Europa y los Estados Unidos, influyendo a otros clérigos y laicos en diversos movimientos de “Justicia Social” con su ideología marcadamente de izquierda. Su carrera fue solo el comienzo de un movimiento mucho más amplio, a nivel mundial, para la infiltración del marxismo en la Iglesia Católica.

Décadas de católicos han sido engañados por su confusión entre religión y política, la cual se evidenciaba en su creencia de que el espíritu cristiano nunca podría infundirse en la sociedad mientras el Capitalismo, que sostenía a las “clases propietarias”, continuara existiendo. ⁶

Pero manipular el sistema económico de una nación y alterar las estructuras de clase no puede producir ciudadanos virtuosos, ya que la adquisición del espíritu cristiano es fruto de la gracia divina y no el resultado de una agenda política. Sturzo no fue un representante de la doctrina católica. Fue un formador de opinión, un político divisivo, un compañero de viaje en una misión para transmitir un mensaje político, un ejemplo temprano de demagogo clerical del tipo del cual el Movimiento Litúrgico estaba repleto, como veremos en el siguiente artículo.

Continuará

JLuigi Sturzo, Commonweal, vol. 23, 1941, pp. 537-540.
La causa de beatificación del P. Sturzo se abrió oficialmente el 23 de marzo de 2002, cuando se le otorgó el título de “Siervo de Dios”.
New York Times, 1 de mayo de 1922.
El P. Sturzo se estableció en Inglaterra, donde escribió al Cardenal Bourne, Arzobispo de Westminster, admitiendo que había sido forzado a abandonar Italia por orden de Pío XI. Véase ‘Sturzo a Cardinal Bourne, 15 de noviembre de 1926,’ en Francisco Piva y Francisco Malgeri, Vita di Luigi Sturzo, Roma: Cinque Lune, 1972, p. 291, n. 8. Sus partidarios todavía afirman que renunció a la dirección del PPI y emigró por decisión propia.
Hubert Jedin, Wolfgang Müller, John Dolan, History of the Church, vol. 10, The Church in the Modern Age, Nueva York: Seabury Press, 1986, p. 50.
Luigi Sturzo, Church and State, Nueva York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1939, p. 537.

Publicado el 14 de septiembre de 2026

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Traditionalist Issues

Dialogue Mass - CX

Pre & Post Liturgical Movement Attitudes to Minor Orders

Dr. Carol Byrne, Great Britain

When we compare the traditional view of Minor Orders with the treatment they received at the hands of liturgical reformers in the 20^th century, it becomes evident that the two positions stand in dire contrast to each other. To illustrate this point in greater depth, let us turn again to the exposition of Minor Orders made by Fr. Louis Bacuez who modestly introduced his magnum opus as follows:

Starting the whittling away of respect
for the Minor Orders...

“This little book is a sequel to one we have published on Tonsure. God grant that those who make use of it may conceive a great respect for Minor Orders and prepare for them as they should! The dispositions with which they approach ordination will be the measure of the graces they receive, and on this measure depends, in a great part, the fruit that their ministry will produce. To have a rich harvest the first thing necessary is to sow well: Qui parce seminat parce et metet; et qui seminat in benedictionibus de benedictionibus et metet. (2 Cor. 9:6)” (1)

Little did he realize that when he wrote these words every vestige of respect for the Minor Orders would be whittled away by the concerted efforts of progressivists with a negative and dismissive attitude towards them; and that the Liturgical Movement, which had just begun when he published his book, would be dominated by influential liturgists discussing how to overturn them.

Long before the term “Cancel Culture” was invented, they presented the Minor Orders as a form of class-based oppression perpetrated by a clerical “caste” and as a form of spiritually empty legalism, and they went to great lengths to make them look ridiculous.

Far from showing due respect, this involves quite a considerable degree of contempt, not only for the generations of seminarians who were formed within this tradition, but also for the integrity of the great institution of Minor Orders that had served the Church since Apostolic times. In fact, so great was their animosity towards the Minor Orders that they could hardly wait to strip them of their essential nature as functions of the Hierarchy and turn them into lay ministries.

A tree is known by its fruits

These, then, were the hate-filled dispositions that inspired the progressivist reform, and would determine the graces received and the fruit to be produced by those who exercise the new lay “ministries” as opposed to, and in place of, the traditional Minor Orders.

Fr. Bacuez, who wrote his book in the pontificate of Pius X, could never, of course, have envisaged the demise of the Minor Orders, least of all at the hands of a future Pope. He was concerned lest even the smallest amount of grace be lost in the souls of those preparing for the priesthood:

Blighted fruits from a sick tree

“We shall see, on the Last Day, what injury an ordinand does to himself and what detriment he causes to souls by losing, through his own fault, a part of the graces destined to sanctify his priesthood and render fruitful the fields of the Heavenly Father: Modica seminis detractio non est modicum messis detrimentum. (St. Bernard)” (2)

We do not, however, need to wait till the Last Day to see the effects of a reform that deliberately prevents, as by an act of spiritual contraception, the supernatural graces of the Minor Orders from attaining their God-given end: “to sanctify the priesthood and render fruitful the fields of the Heavenly Father.” For the evidence is all around us that the tree of this reform produced blighted fruits.

First, we note a weakening of the hierarchical structure of the Church and a blurring of the distinction between clergy and laity; second, a “contraceptive” sterility resulting in vocations withering on the vine and below replacement level, seminaries and churches closing down, parishes dying, and the decline in the life of the traditional Catholic Faith as seen in every measurable statistic. The conclusion is inescapable: those who planted this tree and those who now participate in the reform are accomplices in a destructive work.

Advantages of the Minor Orders

A substantial part of Fr. Bacuez’ exposition of the Minor Orders is devoted to the inestimable benefits they bring to the Church. These he divided into the following three categories:

The honor of the priesthood;
The dignity of worship;
The perfection of the clergy.

It is immediately apparent that the Minor Orders were oriented towards the liturgy as performed by the priest and his ministers. In other words, they existed for entirely supernatural ends invested in the priesthood.

A significant and entirely appropriate omission was any mention of active involvement of the laity in the liturgy. Fr. Bacuez’ silence on this issue is an eloquent statement of the mind of the Church that the liturgy is the preserve of the clergy.

We will now take each of his points in turn.

1. The honor of the priesthood

“A statue, however perfect, would never be appreciated by most people, unless it were placed on a suitable pedestal. Likewise the pontificate, which is the perfection of the priesthood, would not inspire the faithful with all the esteem it merits, if it had not beneath it, to give it due prominence, these different classes of subordinate ministers, classes inferior one to another, but the least of which is superior to the entire order of laymen.” (3)

Toppling statues has become popular today:
above, Fr. Serra in central Los Angeles, California

It is an example of dramatic irony that Fr. Bacuez unwittingly chose the theme of a statue supported by a pedestal to illustrate his point. He was not to know that statues of historical figures would become a major source of controversy in the culture wars and identity politics of our age.

Nor could he have foreseen that toppling monuments – both metaphorical and concrete – was to become a favorite sport of the 20^th-century liturgical reformers, their aim being to exalt the status of the laity by “active participation” in clerical roles. And never in his wildest imagination would he have suspected that a future Pope would join in the iconoclastic spree to demolish the Minor Orders about which he wrote with evident pride and conviction.

'Don’t put the priest on a pedestal'

However, the revolutionaries considered that esteem for the Hierarchy and recognition of its superiority over the lay members of the Church was too objectionable to be allowed to survive in modern society. The consensus of opinion among them was that clergy and laity were equals because of their shared Baptism, and placing the priest on a pedestal was not only unnecessary, but detrimental to the interests of the laity.

“Don’t put the priest on a pedestal” was their battle cry. It is the constant refrain that is still doing the rounds among progressivists who refuse to give due honor to the priesthood and insist on accusing the Church of systemic “clericalism.”

But the fundamental point of the Minor Orders – and the Sub-Diaconate – was precisely to be the pedestal on which the priesthood is supported and raised to a position of honor in the Church. When Paul VI’s Ministeria quaedam dismantled the institutional underpinnings of the Hierarchy, the imposing pedestal and columns that were the Minor Orders and Sub-Diaconate were no longer allowed to uphold and elevate the priesthood.

The biblical underpinnings of the Minor Orders

Fr. Bacuez made use of the following passage from the Book of Proverbs:

“Wisdom hath built herself a house; she hath hewn out seven pillars. She hath slain her victims, mingled her wine, and set forth her table.” (9: 1-2)

An ordination to the minor order of exorcist, one of the seven columns

He drew an analogy between “the seven columns of the living temple, which the Incarnate Wisdom has raised up to the Divine Majesty” and all the clerical Orders (four Minor and three Major) that exist for the right worship of God. In this, he was entirely justified. For, in their interpretation of this passage, the Church Fathers concur that it is a foreshadowing of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass performed, as St. Augustine said, by “the Mediator of the New Testament Himself, the Priest after the order of Melchisedek.” (4)

In the 1972 reform, no less than five (5) of the seven columns were brought crashing down from their niches in the Hierarchy to cries of “institutionalized clericalism,” “delusions of grandeur” and “unconscious bias” against the laity.

To further elucidate the affinity of the Minor Orders to the priesthood, Fr. Bacuez gave a brief overview of the cursus honorum that comprised the Orders of Porter, Lector, Exorcist, Acolyte, Sub-Deacon, Deacon and Priest before going on to explain their interrelatedness:

“These seven powers successively conferred, beginning with the last, are superimposed one upon the other without ever disappearing or coming in conflict, so that in the priesthood, the highest of them all, they are all found. The priest unites them all in his person, and has to exercise them all his life in the various offices of his ministry.” (6)

After Ministeria quaedam, however, these rights and powers are no longer regarded as the unique, personal possession of the ordained, but have been officially redistributed among the baptized. It was not simply a question of changing the title from Orders to “ministries”: the real locus of the revolution was in taking the privileges of the “ruling classes” (the representatives of Christ the King) and giving them to their subjects (the laity) as of “right.”

The neo-Marxist message was, and still is, that this was an act of “restorative justice” for the laity who had been “historically wronged.” For the liturgical progressivists, 1972 was, apparently, the year of “compensation.”

Continued

Louis Bacuez SS, Minor Orders, St Louis MO: B. Herder, 1912, p. x. “He who soweth sparingly shall also reap sparingly; and he who soweth in blessings shall also reap blessings.”
Ibid., St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Lenten Sermon on the Psalm ‘Qui habitat,’ Sermones de Tempore, In Quadragesima, Preface, § 1: “If, at the time of sowing, a moderate amount of seed has been lost, the harm done to the harvest will not be inconsiderable.”
Ibid., p. 6.
St. Augustine, The City of God, book XVII, chap. 20: "Of David’s Reign and Merit; and of his son Solomon, and of that prophecy relating to Christ, which is found either in those books that are joined to those written by him, or in those that are indubitably his."
These were the four Minor Orders and the Major Order of the Sub-Diaconate.
L. Bacuez, op. cit., p. 5.

Posted December 10, 2021

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