This isn’t very encouraging. Some Vatican officials are telling the official house organ of the US bishops that Pope Benedict is going to go easy on fixing liturgical abuses.
The Vatican’s top liturgy official said he expects Pope Benedict XVI to move against liturgical abuse with firm teaching and a gentle manner, recognizing that such mistakes often reflect ignorance, not ill will.
Yes, ignorance. Because Liturgiam Authenticam and Redemptionis Sacramentum and about a million other liturgical documents have been published. By this point no one can claim ignorance. We’ve been trying the gentle manner and firm voice for about 25 years and haven’t made any headway. Let’s try the firm manner and firm voice for a while.
Cardinal Arinze spoke about the direction of the new papacy in an interview with Catholic News Service in early February. He said he expected important moves—but not a purge—to improve liturgy under Pope Benedict.
What does the reporter mean by “purge”? Was that the word used by Cardinal Arinze? Let’s play a little game: What important moves could the Holy Father make that would not be considered a “purge” by Catholic News Service?
Come to think of it, the whole thing doesn’t much like Cardinal Arinze, at least what I’ve heard from him before. I’m suspicious. Reading on I get the sense that perhaps he’s saying that the Holy Father is not the PanzerVater we’ve been told he is, that while he holds strong convictions he does takes action in a fatherly way. There won’t be public floggings in St. Peter’s Square, but he will take action—even if it’s not seen in public. The iron fist in the velvet glove approach, if you will.
There’s more to this story than meets the eye.
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Don’t forget, though, that it’s his solid doctrine, gentle voice approach that works so well for him.
The last papacy provided solid doctrine for 25 years (at least I presume it was “solid” since I could never make heads nor tails out of his writings), coupled with a “gentle approach” if that’s what you want to call taking no action at all.
BloodyP, where did you see this technique working for Benedict in the past?
Isn’t there a passage in the gospel where Christ says to do what the Pharisees say, but not to imitate their actions? Well, something like that anyway. (Why does that come to mind just now?)
I am with Domenico and am suspicious of the way the story was spun. For one thing what do we have now and in the recent past but “easy” on liturgical abuses. Documents have been issued but that’s all. The obedient obey and the abusers continue to abuse. Government requires the imposition of ecclesiastical penalties which are supposed to be medicinal. The Holy See’s policy since Bl John XXIII has been to impose them only when pushed to the wall and even then, punches are pulled. Consider theological abuse, say of of Hans Kung: he’s declared no longer a Catholic theologian but he’s not excommunicated nor is he forbidden to preach or say Mass. Kung is no longer a believing Catholic but the Holy See has been loathe to draw the obvious conclusion: the reason Kung is no longer a Catholic theologian should also be the reason he’s suspended or excommunicated. Cardinal Roger Mahoney has publicly defied Redemptionis Sacramentum and there are no consequences. He actually declared those abuses mentioned don’t exist in his diocese. So gentle as opposed to what?
I suspect that the Holy See lacks the manpower to enforce liturgical legislation. In the Diocese of Syracuse alone there are hundreds of liturgies every week and sundry abuses and lapses of taste are a standard feature. This would be difficult for a conscientious bishop to police. (And I have it on passable authority that defiance of Cdl. Arinze’s most recent ordinances is not merely permitted by Bp. Moynihan but is preferred).
The Pope could lead by example by seeing to it that all celebrations at the Vatican and undertaken by himself while on tour be according to spec.
I think we can speculate that the conscience of the priest and the sensibilities of the laity are no longer bound by an authoritative and customary conception of what authentic liturgy is, and it is these sensibilities that police the conduct of liturgy (and continue to do so in Eastern-rite parishes and Anglican congregations). In this light, the result of the abolition of custom would be that liturgy degenerates into a form of artistic self-[removed]“how WE do things here”), which is in concord with the preferences of people who have dispensed with authoritative teaching in favor of limited personal experience and intuition (leavened with professorial speculation in some cases).
The toothpaste is out of the tube and it is going to be very tough to get it back in.
Not convinced of your interpretation, Dom, although I am a neophyte in all of this. I recall seeing Cardinal Arinze in an interview broadcast on EWTN. He was very strong on some issues, but when it came to the Liturgy, he sort of back-pedalled—a kind of “tut-tut” attitude, coupled with something vague like “the world is very big, and in some places the Liturgy is better, in some worse.” I certainly didn’t get the impression anything much was going to be done about it all, and was very disappointed.
Well, well…………..another Pope is a disappointment to tradionalists Catholics. What else is new?
The Pope in past writings, has stated that an over night return to “liturgical correctness” or what ever one would like to call it, would be traumatizing on the faithful. Such an example would be what happened to the faithful in the post V-2 era with the New Mass. I, would agree with him. Just because people were shafted and pulled out of what they knew of the Church forty years ago over night, does not mean that present day Catholics should under go such trauma.
My problem is with Arinze and his slavish adherence to the “reform of the reform” mentality, while proposing to keep the boot of oppression on the neck of the Old
Rite. He states that bishops need to keep control of it. That is pretty much the same as saying not to propagate it. The Old
Rite is more than just the weekly Mass. It envolves an entire parish setting with all of the Old Rite Sacrements. The entire Rite, not just the Mass. JP2 spoke of the entire “former Rite”.
Fr.Neuhaus in First Things wrote that the fate of the document on homosexuals and the priesthood will be the defining moment of this pontificate as Humanae Vitae’s was for Paul VI. Add to that the liturgy. As Art Deco pointed out it is the case more than not that the liturgy in any area in the Latin Church is how We do things here. That has to be a sign of doctrinal havoc because of the maxim that liturgy is intimately tied up with belief, the lex orandi, lex credendi maxim. This is also a defining moment for the pontificate. Will it be more of the same, the present mess getting worse or will there be real correctives having the mettle behind it of a Bl Piux IX and St. Pius X? Exhortations, dialog etc. are not cutting it.
The pastoral approach for the last 40 years has been to teach with a sharp sword and discipline with a wet noodle. If Pope Benedict is unwilling to stand up to bishops like Cardinal Mahony he has three weapons: example, instruction and appointments. Even with appointments, most bishops will still come up through the system.
So far his record on appointments is mixed.
I think you are correct Art Deco, when you say, “The toothpaste is out of the tube and it is going to be very tough to get it back in.” I think we are not going to be able to simply change direction. I’m not sure what’s going to have to happen, in fact.
Art Deco hit the nail right on the head: ”[T]he conscience of the priest and the sensibilities of the laity are no longer bound by an authoritative and customary conception of what authentic liturgy is, and it is these sensibilities that police the conduct of liturgy.”
To put it another way, you cannot legislate common sense.
To continue, common sense has to be formed over a generation. People who grow up with a sense of what is right will be repulsed at the sight of fifty-to-sixty-year-old men acting like mere adolescents. Prosperity, to paraphrase Herbert Hoover, is not “just around the corner.” It’s down the road a ways.
Liturgy is intercommunication with God. Since God is pure spirit, He is not present to us in a material sense. Hence we must address Him in forms of allegory and symbol, and that is what liturgy is.
Liturgy is prayer. It is the highest form of prayer known to man.
God has a stake in liturgy. He fulfills a pledge in liturgy. But we must do our part by also fulfilling our pledge. The details of that pledge come to us through the Magisterium, of which the primary member is the Pope, and of which the parish priest is not a part, nor is the bishop who departs from papal teaching.
The parish priest profanes the liturgy by departing from the form established by those who have the God-given authority to establish it. The priest who perverts the liturgy in effect says to his parishioners “I am your god. Don’t pay attention to the representatives of the Church that Jesus established.”
Liturgy is not ours to play with. It belongs to the Almighty. It is His rite. What would we think if the words of the Our Father were changed every week? No priest would have the audacity to do that. Yet the liturgy is a much greater prayer than the Our Father. Why are there priests who believe they can trifle with it?
ince God is pure spirit, He is not present to us in a material sense.
One correction: God is materially present in the liturgy. He has a Real Presence.
He does, indeed. However, that Presence doesn’t have a material form that we associate with the human form. The appearances—the accidents of bread and wine—remain. And so the Host and the Precious Blood also have a symbolical nature contained in the accidents. If we see a host, whether consecrated or not, we think of Christ, yet we actually gaze upon bread. Even if we are looking at oplatki, we think of Christ because it resembles the host. If we look at an empty chalice we think of Christ. The vessels themselves are symbolical, and we know the meaning that the symbol conveys. If the vessels are tampered with, the tampering interferes with the symbolical meaning. The entire prayer of the Mass is like that. Tweaking and tampering destroy it.
Regardless, Carrie (and Dom) the Doc on Lit of VII tells us that ‘the material…is subordinate to the spiritual’ in liturgy.
B-16 is doing his best right now—leading by example. It is up to his Bishops to correct, admonish, etc., the disobedient, not up to the Pope…
Skulls….Hell…..roadway
The Holy Father has said in the past that the Church may become smaller, and the liturgy may be one example of this in the making. I think David Alexander is right when he speaks in terms of “generations.” No matter what course Benedict XVI takes, he may lose at least another generation. If he makes no fundamental changes, the present generation is lost, not to mention those who have been wandering in the liturgical desert for 40 years. If he legislates the basic required changes, it will drive away the “Our Mass, Our Way” crowd, and it will take at least a generation to recover their children. If he grants the universal indult, there will be serious resistance all the way down to your local pastor, and it will take more than one generation to re-establish the old rite in any meaningful way. Pray for our Holy Father; he has a difficult road ahead of him—and pray that the Church raises up another St. Charles Borromeo or St. Francis de Sales.
Carrie,
I don’t disagree, but I would also suggest that it is the priest, in persona Christi, who gives us that material image. Which is why liturgical antics by the priest are so destructive and amplifies your point.
It’s true that it’s up to the bishops to correct and admonish the disobedient. However, don’t forget the Pope is the Bishop of Rome and the Bishop of the Catholic Church. It is also his task as Chief Shepherd especially when a bishop is not doing his job or is part of the problem. It is a mess and there’s no easy way out but this won’t be solved simply by issuing documents hoping people will obey them.
Personally, I never judge a man’s ability to take charge of anything based on what happens or doesn’t happen the first year.
Doesn’t seem to be a problem for others, though.
The priest is a vehicle, Dom. An instrument. Like John the Baptist, he is meant to decrease while Christ increases. This was much more obvious when the priest did not face the people. When we looked at his back, we looked through him to Christ—to God the Father. Now that we look at his face, our visionary perception stops with him.
One thing that comes out when reading occult material is the absolute belief the occultist has that he can be an instrument of transformation. Our priests have lost that perception. And with that loss they have turned the greatest prayer man can utter into a mystery play, in which they believe they can instill their own elements.
The term “Great Work” is tossed around in occult material constantly. There is a real Great Work. It was done on Calvary, and it is repeated every time the prayer of the Mass is said. We really no longer perceive what we have.