Next Extraordinary Consistory: June 26-27

The Vatican has Provided No Answers Regarding Who's Calling the Shots and Changing Everything, Making the Consistory Much Less Collaborative, Transparent and Efficient than the Previous Venue and Procedure of Consistories of Cardinals --Diana Montagna

In Pope Leo's first extraordinary consistory there was a last minute unexplained change from the general discussion format in the New Synod Hall of previous extraordinary consistories to a format of strictly guided table group discussions in the Pope Paul VI Audience Hall, along with very limited opportunities for individual cardinals to address the whole gathering, was a significant shift in the consultative relations between the Pope and the College of Cardinals.

Why the traditional format of Pope Leo’s first consistory was replaced at the last minute—and by whom—remains unclear, but the shift is significant.

The new arrangement brings in external controls on the freedom of each cardinal to speak and to be heard and creates a new level of bureaucratic management of communication between the cardinals and the Pope. Whatever the goal of this synodal style, it has the effect of significantly reducing the opportunity for open general discussion and limits the number of cardinals who can be heard.

Earlier this week it was reported that Cardinal Re has written to the Cardinals informing them that the next extraordinary consistory will be held on June 26-27, beginning at 9:00 a.m. This is one day earlier than previously anticipated and allows for two full days of sessions without extending into Sunday.

The format has yet to be decided. The Cardinal added that further details would be communicated as they become available.

Given the nature of an extraordinary consistory as articulated in the Code of Canon Law, its format ought to enable the Pope to listen to the Cardinals unfiltered.

Whether that principle will, in fact, be borne out in practice remains to be seen.

Word and Sacrament: Pickstock, Ratzinger and Percy --ChatGPT

 

 

Catherine Pickstock, Joseph Ratzinger and Walker Percy on the Liturgy

 

Catherine Pickstock, Joseph Ratzinger, and Walker Percy each approach the liturgy from very different angles—philosophical theology, doctrinal theology, and literary-existential reflection—but they converge on a shared intuition: liturgy is not just a human construct or symbolic performance; it is a participatory encounter with reality at its deepest level.

Catherine Pickstock (especially in After Writing) offers the most philosophically radical account. She argues that modernity’s emphasis on fixed meaning, clear reference, and “presence” actually distorts language and reality. For her, premodern liturgical language—especially the Latin Mass—embodies a kind of non-finalizable meaning. The liturgy resists closure; it is rhythmic, repetitive, and always pointing beyond itself. This “open-ended” quality reflects participation in divine truth, which can never be fully captured. So liturgy, for Pickstock, is not just worship—it is the site where language itself is healed and reoriented toward God.

By contrast, Joseph Ratzinger (notably in The Spirit of the Liturgy) is less postmodern and more patristic and Augustinian. He insists that liturgy is fundamentally received, not invented. Its form develops organically within the Church and is oriented toward God, not the community’s self-expression. He is particularly concerned with recovering a sense of transcendence—what he sometimes calls “cosmic liturgy,” where worship unites heaven and earth. Ratzinger critiques overly anthropocentric liturgical reforms, arguing that when liturgy becomes about us, it loses its essence as participation in Christ’s self-offering.

Walker Percy brings a different lens. Though not a systematic liturgical theologian, his essays (like “The Delta Factor”) and fiction explore the crisis of meaning in modernity. Percy is fascinated by signs, symbols, and the breakdown of genuine communication. From his semiotic perspective, liturgy can be seen as a restored symbolic order—a place where signs actually do something, where they connect us to reality rather than alienate us from it. In a world of degraded language and empty signs, liturgy becomes one of the few remaining spaces where meaning is embodied and transformative.

Where they converge:

• All three resist the reduction of liturgy to mere expression or didactic tool.
• They see it as participatory—something that forms us by drawing us into a reality we don’t control.
• Each, in their own way, critiques modernity’s flattening of meaning and transcendence.

Where they differ:

• Pickstock leans into post-structuralist philosophy, emphasizing indeterminacy and linguistic excess.
• Ratzinger stresses continuity, order, and theological clarity grounded in tradition.
• Percy approaches indirectly, diagnosing modern alienation and pointing to liturgy as a kind of semiotic cure.

If you’re trying to synthesize them, one way to put it:

• Pickstock explains why liturgy must exceed our conceptual grasp,
• Ratzinger explains what liturgy is in the life of the Church,
• Percy helps explain why modern people desperately need it.

If you want, I can map specific passages (e.g., Pickstock on repetition, Ratzinger on orientation, Percy on symbols) to show where they explicitly line up or clash.

OK

 

Great—let’s put them in closer dialogue by lining up a few specific themes and showing how Catherine Pickstock, Joseph Ratzinger, and Walker Percy each treat them.

---

1. Repetition vs. “Saying Something New”

Pickstock (After Writing)
She defends liturgical repetition as ontologically necessary. Repetition isn’t redundancy—it prevents closure. Every return to the same words (e.g., the Canon of the Mass) deepens participation rather than exhausting meaning. For her, modern demands for novelty flatten language into mere information transfer.

Ratzinger (Spirit of the Liturgy)
He also defends repetition, but for a different reason: continuity with tradition and formation of the soul. Repetition shapes memory and aligns the worshipper with the Church across time. It’s less about linguistic indeterminacy and more about fidelity and formation.

Percy (essays on language and semiotics)
Percy would say repetition is what rescues signs from trivialization. In modernity, repeated words become clichés—but in liturgy, repetition restores depth. Why? Because the context is charged with intention and communal recognition. The same words don’t decay; they intensify.

Tension:

• Pickstock: repetition = resistance to final meaning
• Ratzinger: repetition = stability of meaning
• Percy: repetition = recovery of meaningful sign-use

---

2. Language: Does It Point or Participate?

Pickstock
Language in liturgy doesn’t just refer to God—it participates in divine reality. She’s explicitly anti-representational: liturgical speech is a kind of event.

Ratzinger
He agrees, but grounds it sacramentally: liturgical words are effective because they are tied to Christ’s action and the Church’s tradition. The Eucharistic prayer doesn’t just describe—it makes present.

Percy
From a semiotic angle, Percy distinguishes between signals (mere data) and symbols (which open up a world). Liturgy is where symbols function properly again—they don’t just point; they transform the participant’s relation to reality.

Convergence:
All three reject the idea that liturgy is just informational or expressive language.

---

3. Human Creativity vs. Received Form

Pickstock
She’s surprisingly critical of modern liturgical improvisation. Why? Because when we try to control language completely, we lose its participatory depth. True liturgy must precede us.

Ratzinger
Even more explicit: liturgy is not something we make. His famous line is that liturgy “grows organically” and cannot be fabricated. When it becomes a product of planning committees, it collapses into self-expression.

Percy
Percy would frame this as a crisis of modern “sovereign selfhood.” When humans think they generate meaning entirely, symbols break down. Liturgy works precisely because it’s received, not invented.

Strong agreement here.
All three are deeply suspicious of liturgy as a human project.

---

4. Transcendence vs. Immanence

Pickstock
Transcendence appears as excess—meaning that always escapes full grasp. The liturgy destabilizes any attempt to domesticate God.

Ratzinger
Transcendence is central: liturgy must be oriented toward God, not toward the congregation. His emphasis on “orientation” (even physically, like facing east) reflects this.

Percy
He diagnoses modernity as trapped in immanence—everything reduced to functional, measurable terms. Liturgy reintroduces transcendence by restoring a symbolic horizon that exceeds utility.

---

5. The Crisis of Modernity

Pickstock
Modern philosophy (especially post-Cartesian) fractures language and being. Liturgy is a counter-practice that preserves participatory metaphysics.

Ratzinger
Modernity forgets God and turns worship into self-celebration. Liturgical reform goes wrong when it mirrors this anthropocentrism.

Percy
Modern people are alienated, surrounded by signs that no longer connect them to reality. This leads to boredom, despair, and dislocation. Liturgy is one of the few places where signs still “work.”

---

A Sharp Way to See Their Differences

If you compress their positions:

• Pickstock: Liturgy saves language from philosophical collapse.
• Ratzinger: Liturgy saves worship from becoming self-centered.
• Percy: Liturgy saves human beings from semiotic alienation.

---

Where They Might Actually Disagree

This is where it gets interesting:

• Pickstock vs. Ratzinger
  Pickstock’s embrace of indeterminacy can seem at odds with Ratzinger’s emphasis on doctrinal clarity and stable meaning. He would likely worry that too much “openness” risks relativizing truth.
• Percy vs. Pickstock
  Percy still assumes that symbols ultimately communicate something real, even if mysteriously. Pickstock pushes harder toward the idea that meaning is never fully present at all.
• Percy vs. Ratzinger
  Less tension here—but Percy is less concerned with ecclesial authority and more with existential experience.

---

If you want to go even deeper, we could zoom in on one concrete element—like the Eucharistic Prayer, silence, or ritual gesture—and track how each of them would interpret that exact moment.

Yes, do that with Gregorian Chant

 

Perfect—Gregorian chant is where their differences become really vivid, because it sits right at the intersection of language, music, embodiment, and transcendence.

---

1. What is Gregorian chant doing?

Before comparing them: Gregorian chant is not just music added onto the liturgy—it is liturgical speech heightened. It stretches language, slows it down, and removes it from ordinary communicative use.

That’s exactly why all three thinkers would find it so significant.

---

2. Catherine Pickstock: Chant as the Undoing of Modern Language

For Catherine Pickstock, chant exemplifies what she thinks all true liturgical language does.

• Chant disrupts linear, informational speech.
• The melody prevents words from being reduced to clear, discrete units of meaning.
• Time becomes non-utilitarian—you can’t rush chant without destroying it.

In her terms, chant resists “final signification.” The meaning is never fully present or exhausted.

So instead of:

“Here is a message about God”

chant becomes:

“Here is participation in divine reality that cannot be fully said.”

The drawn-out vowels, melismas, and repetition create what she would call a kind of linguistic excess—language spilling beyond its ability to contain truth.

👉 For Pickstock, Gregorian chant is almost the ideal form of language because it refuses to collapse into modern efficiency.

---

3. Joseph Ratzinger: Chant as the Voice of the Church, Not the Individual

Joseph Ratzinger takes a more theological and ecclesial approach.

He consistently elevates Gregorian chant as:

• The normative music of the Roman Rite
• A form that expresses the primacy of the Word
• Music that grows organically from the liturgy rather than being imposed on it

For him, chant has a few key qualities:

a. It’s non-performative

It doesn’t feel like a concert. There’s no spotlight on the individual singer.

b. It’s cosmic

Ratzinger often connects chant to the idea of “cosmic liturgy”—creation itself praising God. Chant feels less like self-expression and more like entering something already underway.

c. It disciplines emotion

Unlike modern worship music that tries to generate feelings, chant orders emotion toward contemplation.

So while Pickstock emphasizes linguistic openness, Ratzinger emphasizes obedience, form, and orientation toward God.

👉 For him, chant works because it removes ego and lets the liturgy speak.

---

4. Walker Percy: Chant as the Restoration of the Symbol

Walker Percy gives you a totally different entry point.

Percy is obsessed with how modern people are surrounded by dead signs—language that no longer connects us to reality.

Gregorian chant, in his framework, would be fascinating because:

a. It slows down sign-use

You can’t treat chant like a quick signal (like a text message). It demands attention and participation.

b. It reunites word and body

Breath, tone, rhythm—chant is embodied language. That matters for Percy, because modern semiotics often becomes disembodied and abstract.

c. It creates a “naming event”

Percy thinks real language happens when something is recognized and shared. Chant does this communally—it’s not just said; it’s enacted together.

👉 In a world of empty slogans and mass media noise, chant would strike Percy as one of the few places where symbols still actually connect you to what they signify.

---

5. Where They Converge on Chant

All three would strongly agree that Gregorian chant:

• Is not entertainment
• Cannot be reduced to personal expression
• Works precisely because it is received, traditional, and structured
• Changes the mode of perception—you don’t just hear it; you’re formed by it

---

6. Where the Tension Shows Most Clearly

Here’s the sharpest contrast:

• Pickstock: Chant destabilizes meaning (in a good way)
• Ratzinger: Chant stabilizes and transmits meaning
• Percy: Chant restores meaning

Same object—three different diagnoses of what’s gone wrong in modernity.

---

A Concrete Moment: A Melisma on “Alleluia”

Take a long melismatic “Alleluia”:

• Pickstock:
  The extended melody shows that praise exceeds propositional language. Meaning is overflowing.
• Ratzinger:
  The word “Alleluia” becomes contemplation. The music lifts it beyond speech into worship aligned with heaven.
• Percy:
  The word stops being a dead religious cliché and becomes a living symbol again—something experienced, not just recognized.

---

Bottom Line

Gregorian chant is almost like a test case:

• If you think modern language is too rigid → you get Pickstock
• If you think modern worship is too self-centered → you get Ratzinger
• If you think modern life has emptied meaning altogether → you get Percy

And chant answers all three critiques at once—but in different ways depending on what you think the problem is.

The Men's Activist Movement Vindicated --Cassie Jaye

Here is an excellent 15 minute presentation by a feminist-turned-men's-movement-apologist  which is very helpful in the discussion of men's issues (Cassie Jaye who researched men's rights activists and made The Red Pill movie).

Here are some sound bites.

• "Men can be abused too and they deserve care and compassion."

• "[Men's rights activists] are trying to add to the gender equality discussion."

• "Who is standing up for the good-hearted honorable man that loses his scholarships, his job, or, worse yet, his children, because he is accused of something he absolutely did not do? Well, I couldn't keep denying the points that they were making. There are real issues!"

• "Why doesn't our society care about men's rights?"

• "The greatest challenge I faced was pealing back the layers of my own bias. It turns out I did meet my enemy, while filming. It was my ego, saying that I was right, and they were sub-human!"

• "But I must clarify. I am not anti-feminist and I am not a men's rights activist. I still support women's rights. And I now care about men's rights as well. However, I believe if we want to honestly discuss gender equality, we need to invite all voices to the table. Yet, this is not what is happening! Men's groups are continually vilified, falsely referred to as 'hate groups.' And their voices are systematically silenced....If one group is being silenced, that's a problem for all of us."

• "[My advise to everyone:] We have to stop expecting to be offended. And we have to start, truly, openly and sincerely listening."
• 
  

"After years of researching and fact-checking what the men's rights activists were telling me, there is no denying that there are many human rights issues that uniquely, or disproportionately affect men.

• Paternity fraud uniquely affects men.

• The United States Selective Service in the case of a draft, still uniquely affects men.

• Work-place deaths, disproportionately men.

• War-deaths, overwhelmingly men.

• Suicide, overwhelmingly men.

• Sentencing disparity.

• Life expectancy.

• Child custody. 

• Child support.

• False rape allegations.

• Criminal court bias.

• Misandry.

• Failure to launch.

• Boys falling behind in education

• Homelessness.

• Veterans' issues.

• Infant male genital mutilation.

• Lack of parental choice once a child is conceived.

• Lack of resources for male victims of domestic violence.

"So many issues, that are heat-breaking, if you are the victim, or you love someone who's the victim of any one of these issues! These are men's issues! And most people can't name one, because they think, well, men have all the rights, they have all the power and privilege! But these issues deserve to be acknowledged; they deserve care attention, and motivation, for solutions."

 --Cassie Jaye (erstwhile feminist activist)

The Pell Report: Assessment of Pope Francis

The Vatican today

Memorandum

Commentators of every school, if for different reasons, with the possible exception of Father Spadaro, SJ, agree that this pontificate is a disaster in many or most respects; a catastrophe.

1. The Successor of St. Peter is the rock on which the Church is built, a major source and cause of worldwide unity. Historically (St. Irenaeus), the Pope and the Church of Rome have a unique role in preserving the apostolic tradition, the rule of faith, in ensuring that the Churches continue to teach what Christ and the apostles taught. Previously it was: “Roma locuta. Causa finita est.” Today it is: “Roma loquitur. Confusio augetur.”

(A) The German synod speaks on homosexuality, women priests, communion for the divorced. The Papacy is silent.

(B) Cardinal Hollerich rejects the Christian teaching on sexuality. The Papacy is silent. This is doubly significant because the Cardinal is explicitly heretical; he does not use code or hints. If the Cardinal were to continue without Roman correction, this would represent another deeper breakdown of discipline, with few (any?) precedents in history. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith must act and speak.

(C) The silence is emphasised when contrasted with the active persecution of the Traditionalists and the contemplative convents.

2. The Christo-centricity of teaching is being weakened; Christ is being moved from the centre. Sometimes Rome even seems to be confused about the importance of a strict monotheism, hinting at some wider concept of divinity; not quite pantheism, but like a Hindu panentheism variant.

(A) Pachamama is idolatrous; perhaps it was not intended as such initially.

(B) The contemplative nuns are being persecuted and attempts are being made to change the teachings of the charismatics.

(C) The Christo-centric legacy of St. John Paul II in faith and morals is under systematic attack. Many of the staff of the Roman Institute for the Family have been dismissed; most students have left. The Academy for Life is gravely damaged, e.g., some members recently supported assisted suicide. The Pontifical Academies have members and visiting speakers who support abortion.

3. The lack of respect for the law in the Vatican risks becoming an international scandal. These issues have been crystalized through the present Vatican trial of ten accused of financial malpractices, but the problem is older and wider.

(A) The Pope has changed the law four times during the trial to help the prosecution.

(B) Cardinal Becciu has not been treated justly because he was removed from his position and stripped of his cardinalatial dignities without any trial. He did not receive due process. Everyone has a right to due process.

(C) As the Pope is head of the Vatican state and the source of all legal authority, he has used this power to intervene in legal procedures.

(D) The Pope sometimes (often) rules by papal decrees (motu proprio) which eliminate the right to appeal of those affected.

(E) Many staff, often priests, have been summarily dismissed from the Vatican Curia, often without good reason.

(F) Phone tapping is regularly practised. I am not sure how often it is authorized.

(G) In the English case against Torzi, the judge criticised the Vatican prosecutors harshly. They are either incompetent and/or were nobbled, prevented from giving the full picture.

(H) The raid by the Vatican Gendarmeria, led by Dr. Giani in 2017 on the auditor’s (Libero Milone) office on Italian territory was probably illegal and certainly intimidating and violent. It is possible that evidence against Milone was fabricated.

4. (A) The financial situation of the Vatican is grave. For the past ten years (at least), there have nearly always been financial deficits. Before COVID, these deficits ranged around €20 million annually. For the last three years, they have been around €30-35 million annually. The problems predate both Pope Francis and Pope Benedict.

(B) The Vatican is facing a large deficit in the Pensions Fund. Around 2014 the experts from COSEA estimated the deficit would be around € 800 million in 2030. This was before COVID.

(C) It is estimated that the Vatican has lost € 217 million on the Sloane Avenue property in London. In the 1980’s, the Vatican was forced to pay out $ 230 million after the Banco Ambrosiano scandal. Through inefficiency and corruption during the past 25-30 years, the Vatican has lost at least another € 100 million, and it probably would be much higher (perhaps 150-200 million).

(D) Despite the Holy Father’s recent decision, the process of investing has not been centralized (as recommended by COSEA in 2014 and attempted by the Secretariat for the Economy in 2015-16) and remains immune to expert advice. For decades, the Vatican has dealt with disreputable financiers avoided by all respectable bankers in Italy.

(E) The return on the 5261 Vatican properties remains scandalously low. In 2019, the return (before COVID) was nearly $ 4,500 a year. In 2020, it was € 2,900 per property.

(F) The changing role of Pope Francis in the financial reforms (incomplete but substantial progress as far as reducing crime is concerned, much less successful, except at IOR, in terms of profitability) is a mystery and an enigma.

Initially the Holy Father strongly backed the reforms. He then prevented the centralization of investments, opposed the reforms and most attempts to unveil corruption, and supported (then) Archbishop Becciu, at the centre of Vatican financial establishment. Then in 2020, the Pope turned on Becciu and eventually ten persons were placed on trial and charged. Over the years, few prosecutions were attempted from AIF reports of infringements.

The external auditors Price Waterhouse and Cooper were dismissed and the Auditor General Libero Milone was forced to resign on trumped up charges in 2017. They were coming too close to the corruption in the Secretariat of State.

5. The political influence of Pope Francis and the Vatican is negligible. Intellectually, Papal writings demonstrate a decline from the standard of St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict. Decisions and policies are often “politically correct”, but there have been grave failures to support human rights in Venezuela, Hong Kong, mainland China, and now in the Russian invasion.

There has been no public support for the loyal Catholics in China who have been intermittently persecuted for their loyally to the Papacy for more than 70 years. No public Vatican support for the Catholic community in Ukraine, especially the Greek Catholics.

These issues should be revisited by the next Pope. The Vatican’s political prestige is now at a low ebb.

6. At a different, lower level, the situation of Tridentine traditionalists (Catholic) should be regularised.

At a further and lower level, the celebration of “individual” and small group Masses in the mornings in St. Peter’s Basilica should be permitted once again. At the moment, this great basilica is like a desert in the early morning.

The COVID crisis has covered up the large decline in the number of pilgrims attending Papal audiences and Masses.

The Holy Father has little support among seminarians and young priests and wide-spread disaffection exists in the Vatican Curia.

The Next Conclave

1. The College of Cardinals has been weakened by eccentric nominations and has not been reconvened after the rejection of Cardinal Kasper’s views in the 2014 consistory. Many Cardinals are unknown to one another, adding a new dimension of unpredictability to the next conclave.

2. After Vatican II, Catholic authorities often underestimated the hostile power of secularization, the world, flesh, and the devil, especially in the Western world and overestimated the influence and strength of the Catholic Church.

We are weaker than 50 years ago and many factors are beyond our control, in the short term at least, e.g. the decline in the number of believers, the frequency of Mass attendance, the demise or extinction of many religious orders.

3. The Pope does not need to be the world’s best evangelist, nor a political force. The successor of Peter, as head of the College of Bishops, also successors of the Apostles, has a foundational role for unity and doctrine. The new pope must understand that the secret of Christian and Catholic vitality comes from fidelity to the teachings of Christ and Catholic practices. It does not come from adapting to the world or from money.

4. The first tasks of the new pope will be to restore normality, restore doctrinal clarity in faith and morals, restore a proper respect for the law and ensure that the first criterion for the nomination of bishops is acceptance of the apostolic tradition. Theological expertise and learning are an advantage, not a hinderance for all bishops and especially archbishops.

These are necessary foundations for living and preaching the Gospel.

5. If the synodal gatherings continue around the world, they will consume much time and money, probably distracting energy from evangelization and service rather than deepening these essential activities.

If the national or continental synods are given doctrinal authority, we will have a new danger to world-wide Church unity, whereby e.g., the German church holds doctrinal views not shared by other Churches and not compatible with the apostolic tradition.

If there was no Roman correction of such heresy, the Church would be reduced to a loose federation of local Churches, holding different views, probably closer to an Anglican or Protestant model, than an Orthodox model.

An early priority for the next pope must be to remove and prevent such a threatening development, by requiring unity in essentials and not permitting unacceptable doctrinal differences. The morality of homosexual activity will be one such flash point.

6. While the younger clergy and seminarians are almost completely orthodox, sometimes quite conservative, the new Pope will need to be aware of the substantial changes effected on the Church’s leadership since 2013, perhaps especially in South and Central America. There is a new spring in the step of the Protestant liberals in the Catholic Church.

Schism is not likely to occur from the left, who often sit lightly to doctrinal issues. Schism is more likely to come from the right and is always possible when liturgical tensions are inflamed and not dampened.

Unity in the essentials. Diversity in the non-essentials. Charity on all issues.

7. Despite the dangerous decline in the West and the inherent fragility and instability in many places, serious consideration should be given to the feasibility of a visitation on the Jesuit Order. They are in a situation of catastrophic numerical decline from 36,000 members during the Council to less than 16,000 in 2017 (with probably 20-25% above 75 years of age). In some places, there is catastrophic moral decline.

The order is highly centralized, susceptible to reform or damage from the top. The Jesuit charism and contribution have been and are so important to the Church that they should not be allowed to pass away into history undisturbed or become simply an Asian-African community.

8. The disastrous decline in Catholic numbers and Protestant expansion in South America should be addressed. It was scarcely mentioned in the Amazonian Synod.

9. Obviously, a lot of work is needed on the financial reforms in the Vatican, but this should not be the most important criterion in the selection of the next Pope.

The Vatican has no substantial debts but continuing annual deficits will eventually lead to bankruptcy. Obviously, steps will be taken to remedy this, to separate the Vatican from criminal accomplices and balance revenue and expenditure. The Vatican will need to demonstrate competence and integrity to attract substantial donations to help with this problem.

Despite the improved financial procedures and greater clarity, continuing financial pressures represent a major challenge, but they are much less important than the spiritual and doctrinal threats facing the Church, especially in the First World.

– Demos

https://www.ncregister.com/blog/cardinal-pell-and-the-demos-memorandum