“In his homily Thursday Pope Francis stressed the need to be open to the novelty of the Holy Spirit, by discerning new movements and directions without being immediately closed off from them.”

Source: Be open to the surprises of the Holy Spirit, Pope Francis advises :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

One of those surprises might be that the Holy Spirit is calling Vatican II Catholics to raise up a new Rite in union with the Pope and alongside the 23 other Catholic Rites including the Roman Rite.

As part of a larger family from its beginning, the Roman Rite/Church has blessed Catholicism with its many gifts, flaws and demands. In all this, it has always operated out of a monarchical God/authority theology with its rewards/punishments system of order.  Vatican II altered that vision of God and Catholicism.

  Vatican II will always be unacceptable at heart to the strictest understanding of Roman Rite Catholicism, except for those document statements which back-up traditionalism.  Roman Rite Catholicism is merely protecting and defending both the theology it considers to be God’s Will and the Church’s role and identity as it sees it.

Therefore, in appreciation for the Roman Rite and all it has done to bring Catholicism forward to us, we Vatican II Catholics have basically two options for remaining within the larger Catholic family in union with the pope…other than staying with the Roman Rite or joining one of the 22 Eastern Catholic Rites in union with Rome:

(1) Fight exceedingly well-organized, well-connected and well-supported entities like Opus  D e i which are not going to allow their Rite/Church to meld into a Vatican II mold no matter how patiently we hope and pray otherwise, no matter how hard Good Pope Francis tries to bring them around to the Spirit of Vatican II and other “innovations”.

(2) The other option for Vatican II Catholics is to take this “now quiet but still strong” rejection of Vatican II on the part of Roman traditionalism as the work of the Spirit…calling us forth to stand as strongly in our understanding of Catholicism as they do in theirs.

Then, maybe we hear the Holy Spirit trying to tell us something we don’t want to hear, even telling Pope Francis something he doesn’t want to hear…that we need both a Roman Catholic AND a Vatican II Rite within the fold of the Universal Church.

Seeing (2) as a viable option, we might at some point just want to discuss the possibilities in small groups, then in non-canonical parish or diocesan councils.  You think?

Whatever you do, don’t get overwhelmed with thinking that all this would demand duplicating Roman Rite Church structure.  It would not.