A Blog for Dallas Area Catholics

USCCB “training manual” for priests reveals heart of priest formation problem July 28, 2014

I happened to be at a used bookstore yesterday, browsing their huge but pathetic selection of “Catholic” books. The vast majority were either outwardly modernist and heretical, or they were lost in the dominant secular/progressive mentality and essentially useless. I only found a few good books in the “nostalgia” section, books from way before the Council.  Nothing by TAN, only one book by Loreto, but it I already had…..it was a bust as book shopping goes (not that I really need books, a reader just gifted me a really nice collection that will keep me occupied for a year or more, but I was out, so I looked).

But I did find one book that sort of piqued my interest.  It was from the USCCB’s predecessor, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops.  It was published in the late 90s.  I believe it is still in use.  It was a guidance document ostensibly for all dioceses and seminaries to provide basic guidelines and philosophical underpinnings for the formation of priests.  It’s called Program of Priestly Formation.  While the version I browsed through was from 1999, a 2006 edition is still in use, and the changes between the two are not very significant.

I thought it might be interesting to see what the USCCB had to say regarding what are the most important elements in the formation of priests. I was especially interested in the first section, on the “Foundations of Priestly Formation.”

I wish……I really wish……..I could say that I was blown away by the depth of Catholic sentiment and the communication of a strong understanding of just what Catholic priests do as their highest calling.  But it wasn’t really there.  There was a lot verbiage on the difference between priests and laity (opposing, I suppose, the strong trend in many seminaries to mute this distinction between the two, and pretend that St. Peter’s mention of a “universal priesthood” made the need for consecrated priests passe’), there was discussion of the need for priests to serve as “teacher” and “leader” of the people of God, there was a lot of focus on administrative duties, etc.  But there was one huge thing missing, the thing that makes the Catholic Faith and the Catholic priesthood so utterly vital and necessary.

What was missing was any talk of sacrifice, or the reality of the priest serving as alter Christus during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  And yet, this is the very Source and Summit not only of our Faith, through the miracle of Consecration that occurs at every Mass, but also what gives the priesthood its essence and power.  And yet it was not mentioned at all in the first chapter, nor could I find any references to it throughout the entire document.  I did not read every single word, so there could have been brief mention of this truly amazing, supernatural gift that all priests possess and offer on a continual basis, but I did not find discussion at any substantive length on this vital subject.

That is a most grave omission. I would say it is so grave as to make this formation document gravely deficient, even disordered, possibly deranged.  I certainly pray that this subject of the transcendent role priests play in re-presenting the Most Holy Sacrifice of Calvary receives far more attention in seminaries than it did in this document.  It was pretty disconcerting to see that this guidance document did not mention the subject at all when describing the role of the priest!  I fear that is very revealing, and a potential problem point – among many others – in the formation that most seminarians receive.

Thus it was interesting to me, and quite possibly providential, that I found the video below bandying about traditional sites in the past 24 hours or so.  It has already been deconstructed pretty well by others, but I’ll add a little bit below.  Certainly, I did not find anything so blatantly erroneous and contrary to the spirit of the Church in the USCCB book.  But I think the critical missing elements point to the fact that far too many disgraceful priests like the one below either have a voice in the process of seminary formation, or they have to be at least somehow placated by leaving out the “offensive” reference to Christ, the Sacrifice of the Mass, and all the rest. There is a great deal of evidence that priests like the one below have had a disastrous influence on seminary formation, and the process of approving candidates for ordination, over the past several decades.  All in all, the priesthood has been horribly disfigured and weakened as a result:

I want to talk about his opening erroneous claim, that the Gospels were written way, way, waaaaaay after Christ’s Ascension. First of all, St. Matthew’s Gospel was first, period. Msgr. claims that the most recent “scholarship” places the dates for the writings of the Gospels later and later and later.  That is, first of all, not true. There is a growing body of belief, even among secular academics, in the “early origin” of the Gospels, closer to the time of Christ and more in line with Catholic Tradition.  The “late origin” theory reached its peak about 30 years ago (so did the theory that St.Paul did not write the Letter to the Hebrews).

But even among those that still cling to the “late origin” theory, on what do they base their claims?  The number one underlying assumption of these modernist “scholars” is that miracles are impossible and thus must have a “rational” explanation.  Thus, Christ prophesying the destruction of Jerusalem means that Gospel had to be written after the actual event, or AD 70.  Another foundational error of modernist scholarship is the widely accepted “form” theory of Bultmann, who claimed that writing styles and other factors indicate when a given document was written.  But this theory has been exploded by such examples as, for instance, “proving” that Tennyson never wrote “Idylls of the King” (of course he did, it is the “form” theory that is wrong, it is so nebulous that it can be used to “prove” anything).

More substantially than any of the above, however, is that it does not really matter.  Those who go nuts over precise dates of Scripture miss the fact that the Catholic Faith existed prior to any of the Gospels being written, and for hundreds of years before the Canon of Sacred Scripture was ever determined (by the Church).  We have the infallible knowledge that the Holy Ghost preserved Dogma intact from the Apostles on, in spite of the effects of time and the assaults of too many errors and outright heresies to count.  This can be confirmed in many, many instances by reading what the early Church Fathers themselves believed, which, surprise!, happens to correspond to the Doctrine of the Faith.  The Bible is wonderful, it is vital, but the Church, contrary to the sects, is more than just the Bible.

As I said, most of the rest has already been taken apart handsomely but I wanted to address the typical modernist droning about the dating of the Bible because it has only one purpose – to undermine the orthodox Faith, which is a terrible, terrible sin against charity.  I should also note that this priest comes from the Diocese of Erie, long under the administration of the arch-modernist Bishop Donald Trautman, who is so extreme (thank goodness now retired) that he violently opposed even the very mild improvements to the English translation of the Novus Ordo released in 2011.  So it is little surprise this guy is not only a priest “in good standing,” but was even made a Monsignor.

It is terrible to contemplate the damage to souls such men have wrought. One must ask what possible reason could have kept them in a Church they disbelieve and even seem to hate so much, unless it was to try to hurt Her from within.

To say this man needs prayers would be a great understatement. He needs a massive moral miracle, poor lost soul.

Hey, monsignor, every time you look in the mirror, you see the reason why the traditional movement is experiencing explosive growth.