I Got Some More Insights Into Traditionalism In Yesterday's Post From Fr Hunwicke

Naturally, in. the current controversy over Traditionis Custodes, it's important to understand our fellow Catholics on the other side of the issue. Yesterday's post by Fr Hunwicke, while it seems simple on the surface, carries two subtexts that lead to a deeper understanding of his, and traditionalists', mindset. It begins,

I have always had a soft spot for S Anne, not least because she is the Patron of my wife's college at Oxford (we sent two of our children there) . . .

In his thumbnail, he says he himself has been Senior Research Fellow at Pusey House in Oxford. But just so we're all on the same page, for those of us in the US at least, you need to substitute Yale, or possibly Princeton, for Oxford. Yalies in particular never let you forget they've been to Yale; two recent examples are Glenn Reynolds, whose actual intellectual mentors are Ayn Rand and Hugh Hefner, and Michael Medved, who lost his radio show when his NeverTrumpism became too boring even for the Salem network. Fr Hunwicke's fellow prominent Oxonians include Ghislaine Maxwell.

On one hand, it's never a good idea to cite your alma mater as evidence of your worth; there are too many felons, grifters, and general by-blows among your fellow alums. But in addition, that sort of constant name-dropping -- Fr Hunwicke effectively got four Oxfords into one short sentence -- is evidence of a deep insecurity. Trads seem to cling to figures like Scott Hahn, who not only converted to Catholicism but converted to Latin mass after that, going so far as to call it "superior" to the novus ordo, except he never explains why, just that he likes it. Again, this reflects an insecurity among many trads.

A remark by a visitor brought another issue into context. The visitor suggested that Latin masses tend to be attended by young families with large retinues of children, while novus ordo masses are less that way. The visitor suggested the trads are visibly following the Church's teaching on contraception, while the novus ordo Catholics are not. That's a matter for the confessional in the end, but the visible part is actually a problem.

I thought back to Honor Moore, daughter of Episcopal Bishop Paul Moore Jr, who noted in her memoir that, as her parents had baby after baby en route to a total of nine children, she kept wondering who they were trying to beat. It later emerged that Bp Moore had been a closet bisexual all his life. Large broods of children, especially if the girls are wearing chapel veils, are a statement, not just an outcome.

They can certaimly reflect insecurity, and I hardly think the Moore family was unique in using a large brood to cover for serious behind-the-scenes issues in a marriage. Honor Moore's memoir suggests that a divorce would have ended Bp Moore's career, so there was a mutual interest in maintaining appearances for the sake of lifestyle, though his first wife did not follow him to New York, and they effectively separated. Fr Chad Ripperger, a trad priest, has noted that the kind of stuff that reaches him in the confessional makes him worry that the Latin mass is not having the salutary effect some might claim for it.

So the first issue, which I think applies at least to Fr Hunwicke's constant name-dropping (cf his recent reference to a private e-mail from Prebendary Moreton), is the apparent deep insecurity this reflects.

But there's another issue, which is the self-contradiction that verges on ditziness. This past Friday, Fr Hunwicke placed St John XXIII in his gallery of Hitler popes, or quasi-Hitler popes or something, for promulgating Veterum Sapientia, which did nothing more than assert that Latin is valuable to the Church because it is "universal, immutable, and non-vernacular.” And since Fr Hunwicke is most definitely on the side of universal, immutable, and non-vernacular, he ought to like St John XXIII, but that guy is actually Hitler (or something).

In yesterday's post, he then basically just reprints a Latin hymn to St Anne, no translation, as of course all his readers are naturally expected to be fully conversant with the universal, immutable, and non-vernacular. But they're nevertheless expected, apparently, to hurl anathema upon St John XXIII during the implicit Two Minutes Hate, at least when it suits Fr Hunwicke. I'm sure if anyone calls him on it (I receive copies of comments left on his blog that he won't approve), he'll excuse this in some way or other, oh, no, no, no. he never meant that at all. But isn't there, in the end, a sedevacantist subtext here?

Looking for a picture to use at the top of this post, I found it. Fr Longenecker had already used it in a 2016 post at his blog, where he quotes a traditionalist blogger who says,

. . . young advocates of traditional liturgy like me found ourselves heading to worship God every Sunday in the company of individuals who, as often as not, seemed dour and judgmental. They spoke in effusive terms when they described their Mass, but appeared pained when they actually attended it. No smiles ever seemed to touch their lips, and they would glare at women (like my wife) who would at times forget their chapel veils, or wear makeup, or fail to provide some means of instant corporal punishment at the first sign of a squirming toddler.

He himslf concludes,

[W]hy does there still have to be the sour, negativity, suspicion and persecution complex among some who call themselves traditionalist? . . . The more radical ones play the victim saying they are a persecuted minority, but they sure don’t mind loading their weapons and taking pot shots at everyone with whom they disagree.

The problem is that, in the current controversy, they wind up making Pope Francis's point for him. I think insecurity, based in part on their own uncertainties over Church teaching and a resulting overcompensation, is one cause of the suspicion and persecution complex among the trads. I can't disagree that the Latin mass thing has gotten out of hand.