Michael Voris and His Dad

Michael Voris has recently interviewed his own father, Mr. Russ Voris; and part of the interview appears on the August 20 Vortex.

MV’s dad is 84 years old, and is a convert to the faith; he was received into the Catholic Church in the mid-1950’s, so he experienced the beauty and reverence of the “old Mass” for many years before the Novus Ordo Mass was instituted. He offers some insights into the “before and after” of Vatican II, with amusing asides showing his opinion of the changes he saw.

There is no transcript of the interview available, but I offer my summary and a few choice quotes below the video. 

After Mr. Voris met his future wife (“your future mother”, he says to MV), he sought advice from others, since he knew little about Catholicism. A Lutheran chaplain told him, “Whatever you do, don’t marry a Catholic. They’re out to take over the world!”

Mr. Voris went to see his future wife’s priest, whom he describes as a saintly man; and he found that the answers to his questions “were so sensible, so reasonable. You can’t study the Catholic faith with an open mind and not accept it.”

He describes going to the priest for instruction – “in those days, they instructed you individually,” he notes; MV asked, “There were no RCIA classes?!” Mr. Voris laughed and said, “Thank God, no!”

What was Catholic life like in the 1950’s? Mr. Voris tells us, “There were lines going to confession, every Saturday. There were no altar girls, no Eucharistic ministers. You did not touch the consecrated host. It was truly as it was meant to be, and it had produced saints over millennia. The beauty, the joy, everything about it spoke of God. You walked into a Catholic church and you knew that was God’s house.”

My two cents’ worth: Ah yes. God’s house should be a little intimidating, don’t you think? Awe-inspiring, perhaps? Giving the sense that the Almighty King of the Universe dwells there? The God who holds our lives and all creation in His hand, and is the only reason we exist? Here's the little mission church where I attend:

So sad! Yes there are limits with a tiny church like ours, but we could trade in the '70's style for "classic Catholic", as this photo shows.  (Of course, we'd still need to get rid of the wall Rosary, and replace that dining room captain's chair with something more appropriate for a priest of God!) But the parishioners-in-charge rejected this "style" because "we don't want to scare the children" and "we want people to feel comfortable."

Back to the interview: Mr. Voris notes that the difference between the Church now and the Church in the 1950’s “is the difference between night and day.”

Everything about Catholicism that I learned and absorbed and treasured…I see none of that now. You go to empty churches, empty confessionals…people holding hands at the Our Father, taking Holy Communion in their hands. This is all so contrary to the Catholic faith that I came into.”

He adds, “Nothing would have the same magnetism now that I experienced when I came into the Church.” The “old Mass” drew him in; “the statues, the lamps” and all of the traditional and reverent furnishings of the Church were a part of that magnetism for him.

“Everything spoke of Catholic in that year,” he says; “now it speaks of everything contrary to Catholic.”

Mr. Voris attributes the turn-about to the social upheaval of the 1960’s, Vatican II, the Vietnam War, the sexual revolution and disruption of the family life, etc. He’s not alone, of course, in his opinion that a large number of converging factors have contributed to the current disruption and destruction of the faith we see today.

“Everything that we see in the Church is so different from what the fullness of the truth of our holy Catholic faith is and deserves and it must be told.”

Catholics today, says Mr. Voris, are deprived of understanding of the faith; they are in the dark because the Church has “cast them aside; the Church leaders would “rather have the praise of men and not the salvation of souls.” 

“They’ve been given a tremendous responsibility…to be a priest!? And to see that these priests are doing everything but being priests!? They’re tearing the Church apart, and someone has to do something.”

Amen, Mr. Voris! Amen!