An open letter to Arturo Vasquez

Dear Arturo:

I really like your weblog. I have been following it, thanks to (or if you prefer to blame him, due to) The Young Fogey. I like the approach, which is very nearly that of ‘a voice crying in the wilderness’. The present apospasmatic (or if you prefer, ‘fragmentary’) age may be a technological terror or wonder (depending upon one’s point of view), but it is also a spiritual desert. Too many words. Not enough logos. Someone needs to call it for what it really is. Thanks for doing your part.

As regards your recent entry, Eastern Catholicism: UR DOING IT WRONG, I too have passed the various Kubler-Ross stages as regards Catholicism, from denial as regards how bad it is, to rage over its many failings, to bargaining (‘if only we restore Gregorian Chant. . .’, ‘if only we face the East. . .’, ‘if only we trust His Holiness, the Pope. . .’), to acceptance that it will really never change, save to get worse and worse. I’m expecting the parishes of St. Gilles de Retz in Laguna Beach, or Ss. Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas in either Oakland or Long Beach, or that we have discovered the ancient Liturgy of the Laodiceans, any day now.

I really don’t care any more. I am totally reconciled to the fact that, in spite of the high pronouncements and councils of perfection in the Second Vatican Council (and a lot of good scriptural, patristic and traditional advice there as well), Roman Catholicism in the United States and most other places appears to combine the worst aspects of a clerocracy and the booboisie of H.L. Mencken, and the lunatics in charge of the asylum will continue to do whatever they damned well please.

If you wish to consider this attitude as triumphalism, while I cling to my home parish of St. Andrew Russian Catholic Church with the fervor of a castaway holding on to his piece of wreckage, and for much the same reasons, then I suppose that the First Amendment would entitle you to your opinion. So far.

Unfortunately, I agree with you that the same rot is entering the Eastern Catholic Churches as well. As one example, most RC castaways who have clung to the Ruthenians (as but one example) are happy that their pieces of wreckage, which they call Byzantine Catholic Churches, are still above water. The old timers, among them many Rusyns who have been there far longer, have confessed to the same sinking feeling, though, and have either already bailed or are waiting to bail for something a bit more seaworthy.

I would also agree with you that it is best not to p*ss off the little old ladies. Of such are the stuff of St. Mary of Egypt, or St. Joan of Arc. Pat their heads patronizingly, and you are more than likely to draw back a stump. But from where I am standing, most of them are already more than a bit, er, peeved with both RC and EC churches. They are oh, so, hungry for that little taste of heaven which an honest prayer (or a well-served Liturgy) brings forth, and too many of the clerks have been depriving them of even the slightest of those tastes. Bad idea.

Speaking of other tastes, while I will sip Jerez if you set it before me, I much prefer either Modelo Negra or Guinness, at room temperature, thank you. I’d be happy to buy the first round, as we speak of Pico della Mirandola and the Christian Cabbalists and Neo-Platonists.

Very truly yours,

Bernard Brandt