Cocoon Catholics----Why Stand Ye Here Idle?

[lumengentleman]

What good intentions? Revolution against one's lawful king (in this case a morally upright Anglican who hated Freemasonry) is not a good intention.

(I'm not trying to quarrel with QVP, with whom I am usually in agreement on these matters, but I couldn't resist asking he obvious question.)

Royalcello, do you have any good recommendations for a history of the American Revolution?

[DominusTecum]

We know about the larger point that Fr. Hunter is making, and we have another thread several pages in length devoted to discussing it and weighing its merits. Thus, it is quite safe to use this thread to discuss "what we thought of the pamphlets," and some of us were rather unimpressed with a given paragraph.

[Sancte_Bernarde]

Hi,

Amen to Charlemange and Dominus Tecum.  I didn't put this on here to cause a debate over Fr. Hunter's personal political beliefs (I don't know why he inserted the paragraph) but rather the large message he is trying to spread.  Also, I just thought it would be easier for people to see with its own thread instead of on the last page of the one which Dominus Tecum refers to.  Also...Charlemange---Your'e very welcome.

 

 

John

[fiatvoluntastua]

Hi Sara,

 

Re: Fr. Hunter, I am sure he is a wonderful priest, and quite orthodox. I do not believe, however, that the founding fathers can be "vindicated." I brought up the controversy regarding Fr. Hunter and his book merely to illustrate that if they are the same priest, then the passage in question in the pamphlet is not particularly a surprise. I don't know what Solange Hertz and Thomas Drolesky say about the Founding Fathers, but I know what certain indisputable facts are. Perhaps I was presumptious in condemning Fr. Hunter's work without having read it, but I trust Fr. Peter Scott, who was the US District Superior, to have made the correct decisions, and I am not so sure that the work would have been "condemned" under ordinary circumstances, but believe that perhaps the refusal of permission stemmed from the controversies of the time, rather than from "doctrinal" reasons. As said, I meant merely to point out that this is not a surprising statement, rather than to pass overall judgement on what I do not know all of the facts on.

 

 

Eric,

 

I know you weren't attacking Fr. Hunter, I just chose your quote because it was a good sum-up of the ideas.

 

I'm sure it is the same priest, because he's mentioned the book- I would love to read it...I think, though, he said it actually was published...but I'd have to ask DH as my memory is fuzzy on that one.  I believe his viewpoint is not that they were Catholic, but more that the ideas are not specifically antithetical to Catholicism.  Incidentally, I'm reading Archbishop Lefebve's "They have uncrowned Him" and he talks about how although a monarchy with elected local government is the ideal, a democracy, or a republic can be in line with Catholic doctrine if certain ideals are kept; he mentions the government of Garcia Moreno as an example. 

 

 

I personally would like to read it (Fr. Hunter's book, or a similar book by a Traditional author) and any recommendations by Royalcello, because I would like to see something from both sides of the issue from a Traditionalist standpoint.  I don't know enough about American history to argue it either way- and I wouldn't even want to try based on the facts I have been exposed to, as I'm sure they're quite wrong. 

 

I mentioned those two because they have both written extensively condemning just about everything about America and its founding, etc. and use it as their "excuse" to basically hide-  Dr. Drolesky in particular, has said numerous times that until Russia is conscencrated to Our Lady, nothing can be done politically.  I would say its ultimate success is not up to us, but that we have a responsibility to try. 

 

My concern about the reaction to that one paragraph in Fr. Hunter's pamphlet is exactly why I think it needed to be written in the first place- the tendency among Traditionalists to use the debate over the founding of our country to avoid doing anything in it.

 

 

[royalcello]

Royalcello, do you have any good recommendations for a history of the American Revolution?

I've ordered Solange Hertz's "The Star-Spangled Heresy: Americanism."  It hasn't arrived yet, but her articles in other sources helped convince me that my instinctive distaste for the American Revolution was in fact also the Catholic position.  I think I've posted these links here long ago; perhaps I can look them up when I'm back on my own computer.

My father read Robert Harvey's (no relation) "A Few Bloody Noses: The Realities and Mythologies of the Revoltionary War," and said it basically brought him around to my view, though once again I must admit I haven't read it.

Look into the Catholic American history curriculum, "Puritan's Progress."  Pagliaccio perhaps can tell you more about that.

[royalcello]

I didn't agree with Fr. Hunter's "larger point" either.  Who are all these "Cocoon Catholics"?  I've never met any.   What exactly is it he wants trads to do that they're not doing?

[royalcello]

Debates about the American founding are crucial, not a "side issue" at all.  How on earth can Catholics effectively fight Freemasonry while admiring men who were mostly Freemasons and built a government according to Masonic principles?  Washington D.C., our money, it's Masonic to the core.  I was just in a bookstore the other day looking at the "DaVinci Code" section and there was this book about how wonderful Freemasonry is and they were boasting about the Masonic foundations of the U.S. government, the Capitol being practically a Masonic temple.  It's not a secret.  How can Catholics justify closing their eyes to it?   How can Catholics fight the ongoing Revolution while defending one of its major manifestations?  

[DominusTecum]

That is the key. We're not just fighting for the Mass, we're not fighting for the traditional sacraments, or for glorious church architecture, or for a good monarchy, or for the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart, we're fighting to stop the revolution dead in its tracks and restore Christendom. We can't get lost on side causes, so that we lose sight of the big picture. In our time, due to the massive revolution which has taken place within the Church, we have been granted a grace not given to many others throughout the last few hundred years; we've been given the chance to see the entire revolution, blow by blow, and to see how one event has lead to another, so that glorious Christendom as it existed in 1300 is now a faint and reviled memory in the collective revolutionary anti-Christian mind of the West. Our task is to work and restore it, and "just" the Mass will not do the trick. They had the Mass in 1517 and Luther came out of his heretical closet. They had the Mass in the 18th century "enlightenment." They had the Mass during the regicidal revolutions throughout Christendom in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. They had the Mass at Vatican II. What they did not have, in all these times, was the pure, unadulterated, Catholic and Apostolic faith.

[Charlemagne]

I see cocoon catholics everywhere.

[royalcello]

Part of what frustrated me about this article, and actually I think Sara has made a similar point previously, which I agreed with, is that I get tired of seeing traditional Catholics beat themselves or their co-religionists up.  I'm not trying to flatter y'all, but honestly I think trads are pretty amazing.  Most of the traditional Catholics I know work hard to raise large families, are totally committed to their faith, and are full of joy in spite of the terrible situation in the world and in the Church.  I know you guys are supposed to strive for perfection, and so the reality will always fall short, but as long as one doesn't get lazy, I don't think it hurts to have some perspective and realize that considering what they're up against, and considering how most people live today, trads are a pretty impressive bunch.  If many trads don't see the point in getting involved in American politics (and I agree with them), it's not because they don't care; it's because they know that the system is stacked against them and at the natural level it's more important to do things that they can really do, like having and raising Catholic children, and supporting an alternative to junk contemporary "culture" by going to the symphony, rather than fret about elections and protests unlikely to accomplish anything.   Most of the trads I know, if what they believe is really true (and obviously I'm not sure or I would have converted by now), I can't imagine that God isn't basically proud of them.  I may have my own criticisms of some traditionalists, but honestly, overall I really like you guys or I wouldn't be here.  Keep doing what you're doing, don't be too hard on yourselves, and give yourselves a break!