By Dr Dencio S Acop
“Better versions of ourselves” is an overused phrase in the world today. But are we or have we really become better versions of our past selves? By all accounts, it is almost impossible to develop as a human being in the right direction without some form of institution guiding us. Two such institutions are those pertaining to our work or career and our faith. One is secular; the other, non-secular. In the end, both are bound to converge as the pursuit of man’s highest end-state cannot really be partitioned as one over or apart from the other. For instance, the “separation of church and state” is easier said than attained. For how can the end of one be divergent from the other when the object of both is one and the same – the human condition? Is the human being the goal and objective of every vital institution or is he just the means to an end? When CEOs or Presidents claim that they have improved the lives of the people under their care, who are still obviously poor, isn’t the claim an oxymoron and yet people believe it as truth anyway? Analyzing institutions in hindsight is gifted with the availability of wisdom unlike at the beginning. With chaos and anarchy gripping the world today, we often wonder how everything has come to this. In the absence of deeper explanations, human minds scour every conceivable theory about what is going on and why. It is yet another gift that proven knowledge exists upon which to validate two phenomena that provide credible explanation as to why the betterment of people impacted by these phenomena has fallen short.
The first phenomenon is the failure of democracy. There is truth to the claim by ordinary people that capitalists and government officials hijacked democracy because they effectively dictated the rules of the game instead of the other way around. While there is some truth to this, exactly how did the people at the top do it? It began with the growth of populations, especially the establishment of basic institutions alongside the mass production that followed the industrial revolution (E.g., mass bureaucracy, mass standing army, mass corporation, mass media, mass public education, etc.). While democracies developed, a managerial regime likewise evolved along with them creating a class of managers who were the technocratic experts in scientific management. In “Managerialism Means the End of Democracy”, NS Lyons argues that the business of the managerial class is not production or service creation but “surveillance and control – of people, information, money, and ideas” – for capitalists at the expense of the ordinary people through a top-down “management” of practically everything. In essence, this ever-expanding managerial class is an extension of the domestic elite comprising the modern oligarchy. In contrast, genuine democracy entails a bottom-up structure where people must first recover their soul and with it their courage and humanity. By today’s standards, automation and artificial intelligence are effectively rendering the modern oligarchy the new totalitarian threat due to its dehumanizing effect upon ordinary people. As the present-day goes, “widely observable is the expression of an emaciated spirit, … when man handed over his divine soul, he handed over his own power, and his humanity along with it”. In essence, what ails democracies is not populism, but a type of regime inimical to democracy itself. How can we become better versions of ourselves when we have surrendered our lives to bureaucratic materialism because of the usual human fears of “ill-fortune, destruction, death, …”? So why have we become so timid and helpless in the modern day? In Lyons’ words, “we must accept that, in our weakness as a people, we have not only allowed the proliferation of bureaucratic control over our lives, but have practically demanded it”. How can man become a better version of himself when: “In exchange for the promise of autonomy, he liberated himself from his own inner strength, internalizing the technological in its place. He fashioned himself into a cold calculator and a scoffer of values but now knows neither strong loves nor higher vision; neither a burning passion for lasting worldly glory nor a confident faith in the immortality of his soul … only the constant anxiety of a herd animal.”
The second phenomenon is the unneeded 1960s reform of the holy mass in the Catholic Church which irrationally brought down the salvation of souls to the level of man away from God’s. For centuries, the liturgical rite of holy mass was faithfully developed according to divine revelation since Jesus Christ handed down the keys of salvation to his apostle Peter. Thus, the Roman rite that painstakingly evolved is a consolidation of all deposits of faith into the highest form of worship of the One True God and Creator of the universe who sent down His Incarnate Son to save the world through the workings of the Holy Spirit. This “right praise” unites the people of God on earth (Church Militant), those who have died and on their way to Heaven (Church Penitent), and those who are already in Heaven (Church Triumphant) along with God’s Angels. It is therefore a worship of God that, while still on this earth, man is able to experience the “presence” of the Triune God (God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit) through human offering of sacrifice that becomes acceptable to the Father because it is co-mingled with the unblemished sacrifice of the Son through the workings of the Holy Spirit. By receiving the consecrated host which is the real presence of Christ in flesh and blood, the faithful is grafted onto Christ and enters into the holy communion of saints while still on earth. This holy communion is made possible because the people of God are the mystical bride of Christ who is the groom. That is why the Catholic Church is called the Mystical Body of Christ. When the presider dismisses the people, the faithful have already been sanctified enough to brave through the world again where temptations to sin against God are ever-increasingly rampant and tenacious. By the time a week (or days) is over, the faithful have been so exposed to evil in the world that they need to recharge their souls in the holy mass once again before continuing through their earthly pilgrimage full of spiritual battles. This is why the Eucharist in holy mass is referred to as the “source and summit” of the Christian life, representing the origin of grace and the highest point of communion with God. The glory of eternal life in heaven with God and the Angels lies at the end of the spiritual warfare on earth. Recall St. Paul who said: “I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7). This passage symbolizes the completion of a faithful life, perseverance through challenges, and looking forward to a “crown of righteousness”. To such end, the Missale Romanum of 1570 (used until the 1960s reform of Vatican II) was the “most perfect liturgical expression of the Catholic teaching on the Eucharist, as the Council of Trent had defined it for all times over against Protestant errors” (Fiedrowicz, 2020). To ensure that the Roman Missal remains unchanged, Pope Saint Pius V promulgated with the power of his apostolic authority the inclusion of the emphatic phrase “for now and for all times” (etiam perpetuo). The superiority of the old rite (Vetus Ordo) over the modern rite (Novus Ordo) is seen in the fact that although the latter rite is the mainstream liturgy due to its adoption, the old rite has never been repealed. Such superiority is also validated by Pope Benedict XVI who staked his papacy on it preferring to resign rather than stay and lead the predominant culture of spiritual mediocrity. In his Summorum Pontificum, Benedict XVI insisted that, in respect of the older liturgy, “what earlier generations held as sacred, remains sacred and great for us too, and it cannot be all of a sudden entirely forbidden or even considered harmful” (Fiedrowicz, 2020). The old rite is united and coherent. The sacredness of its substance and form captures the attention of the spirit. The focus of worship is unmistakable. People who worship participate with due respect and reverence to God just by their presence including the symbolism of the clothing they wear on their heads and bodies. Everything is reverent including the chants. The modern mass has none of these spontaneously inspiring spiritual qualities and attributes. So how can it inspire people to convert or at least become better versions of themselves? Whereas the old rite clearly inspired people towards holiness and sainthood, the one that has been in mainstream practice for half a century has brought down the holy mass to the level of secular worship. There are no better words to summarize than those of Benedict XVI himself: “We will soon have priests reduced to the role of social workers and the message of faith reduced to political vision. Everything will seem lost, but at the right time, at the most dramatic stage of the crisis, the Church will be reborn. She will be smaller, poorer, almost catacombal, but also more holy. Because it will no longer be the Church of those who seek to please the world, but the Church of the faithful to God and his eternal law. Rebirth will be the work of a small rest, seemingly insignificant yet indomitable, passed through a process of purification. Because that’s how God works. Against evil, a small herd resists.”