A sign from Pope Benedict on the liturgy?

The appointment of the new secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship, Archbishop Malcolm Ranjith, may be a signal of Pope Benedict’s intention on the liturgy. Apparently the archbishop, when he was bishop of a diocese in Sri Lanka, was very favorably inclined toward the Tridentine Mass, and even met with Bernard Fellay, leader of the Society of St. Pius X in 2001.

According to sources, he told Fellay that the crisis of the priesthood is a crisis of the identity of the priest and thus a crisis in the liturgy and that a renewal of the priesthood and of the Church must begin with a renewal of the liturgy.

Fellay claims that after Ranjith was appointed to the Roman Curia in 2002, that Ranjith told him, “I agree 200% with you that there really is a problem in the Church with the liturgy and the priesthood, and both go together. We must work on this, and there is no doubt that the Pope has to set free the true Catholic Mass for everyone I am going now to Rome where I will have my private chapel. I have just taken care to get a Missal of St. Pius V to celebrate Mass as it should be.”

This would be a significant statement by the man who is now second in charge at the Congregation for Divine Worship, both for hope for reconciliation with the SSPX and for any possible developments in the reform of the reform of the liturgy.

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