Calling All Liberal Catholics!!
...Benedict XVI is your man! Read all about it (including a period of Catholic theological history I'd never heard of, all in the manic hand of another professed "liberal Catholic") here. (Part II--not to be missed--here.)
And please allow me to spoil the beautiful ending paragraph, which doesn't spoil much because it's pretty much a tangent. Sed pulchrissima!
Now in the interests of total honesty and come-cleanness, there is one area of Catholic life where Cardinal Ratzinger could only be described as a capital-C Conservative. His views on the liturgy, to the horror of some and the delight of others (like me), hold to at best a minimalist reading of the Vatican II reforms. He's a fan of Latin, mass Ad Orientem (i.e. priest facing the same way as the people), and generally speaking much nicer aesthetics. And in my Rad-Trad liturgical fantasies, Pope Benedict XVI the panzer-cardinal swoops down upon Dallas, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis, dynamiting concrete-box churches, excommunicating liturgists,* and implementing an Index of Forbidden Hymnals, followed by mass burnings of the wretched Gather hymnal and any other "musical" publication to come out of Portland, Oregon. Churches will be filled with congregations singing the best of German Catholic and English Protestant foursquare hymns and simplified plainchant. Cheap decorations will be replaced by tasteful frescoes and statuary. **
*Old Catholic joke #1: Q: What's the difference between a liturgist and a terrorist? A: You can negotiate with a terrorist.
**Old Catholic joke #2: No, we don't worship statues; since the 1960's, we worship felt banners.
And please allow me to spoil the beautiful ending paragraph, which doesn't spoil much because it's pretty much a tangent. Sed pulchrissima!
Now in the interests of total honesty and come-cleanness, there is one area of Catholic life where Cardinal Ratzinger could only be described as a capital-C Conservative. His views on the liturgy, to the horror of some and the delight of others (like me), hold to at best a minimalist reading of the Vatican II reforms. He's a fan of Latin, mass Ad Orientem (i.e. priest facing the same way as the people), and generally speaking much nicer aesthetics. And in my Rad-Trad liturgical fantasies, Pope Benedict XVI the panzer-cardinal swoops down upon Dallas, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis, dynamiting concrete-box churches, excommunicating liturgists,* and implementing an Index of Forbidden Hymnals, followed by mass burnings of the wretched Gather hymnal and any other "musical" publication to come out of Portland, Oregon. Churches will be filled with congregations singing the best of German Catholic and English Protestant foursquare hymns and simplified plainchant. Cheap decorations will be replaced by tasteful frescoes and statuary. **
*Old Catholic joke #1: Q: What's the difference between a liturgist and a terrorist? A: You can negotiate with a terrorist.
**Old Catholic joke #2: No, we don't worship statues; since the 1960's, we worship felt banners.