Ten Reasons Why Cardinal Roche’s Document is Only Good for Lining Your Parrot Cage

The document that, according to an article by Diane Montagna, was presented by Cardinal Arthur Roche to the Extraordinary Consistory of January 2026 purports to defend “sound tradition” while simultaneously advocating a theory of perpetual liturgical reform.

If Roche’s treatment of the concept of Catholic Tradition is sound, then I am a time traveller from the planet Zorg.

Upon examination, the theological foundations of this two-page document, which is a thinly veiled defense of Traditionis Custodes, prove incompatible with the Church’s pre–Vatican II magisterium and with classical Catholic theology. What follows are ten reasons why Roche’s arguments are garbage and laughable when read in the light of Roman tradition.

1. It Redefines Tradition in a Manner Unknown to Catholic Theology

The document asserts that Tradition is not the transmission of fixed forms but a “living river” subject to continual change. This notion directly contradicts the Church’s perennial understanding of traditio as that which is handed down.

The Council of Trent defined Tradition as what was “received from the mouth of Christ Himself, or from the Apostles, the Holy Ghost dictating” (Session IV). St. Vincent of Lérins famously insisted that legitimate development occurs only “in the same sense and the same judgment” (eodem sensu eademque sententia). A Tradition that alters its substance is corrupted, not living.

2. It Treats the Roman Rite as Historically Contingent Rather Than Normative

The Consistory document presents the Roman liturgy as a series of culturally conditioned stages, implying that no form possesses normative authority. This view is foreign to Catholic theology.

St. Thomas Aquinas teaches that divine worship belongs to the virtue of religion precisely because it is regulated by God, not human invention (ST II–II, q. 93). Once rites are approved by the Church, they participate in moral stability because they are ordered to the immutable God. The Roman Rite is not one historical option among many; it is the Church’s received norm.

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