This Week’s Discussion Question: The Target of Pope Benedict’s Criticism
Each week this summer, a Pray Tell contributor will put up a question for discussion. Here is the first.
Pope Benedict XVI, before and since his election, has shown himself to be a critic of the liturgical reforms in the Catholic Church. What are the main targets of his criticism? To what extent is his criticism directed at local liturgists and clergy who have incorrectly implemented the official reforms? Or at Paul VI who entrusted Consilium with the reform of the official books? Or at the Second Vatican Council itself in Sacrosanctum Concilium?
Certainly Pope Benedict has certain opinions on the liturgy voiced and written as a Cardinal and things he has actually done once he became pope. There are only two authoritative things that he has done, SP allowing for the older liturgy to be celebrated more liberally as an “Extraordinary Form” of the Church and his mandate that the Latin words of the consecration of the Precious Blood be translated in the vernacular as “for many” rather than “for all.” Tied into this of course is the re-translations of the vernaculars which he inherited and has confirmed. Apart from these, he hasn’t mandated anything but models options that are not common but not disallowed in the GIRM or rubrics, such as his insistence on the older form of decorating the altar when he celebrates Mass and/or facing ad orientem. He also insists that those receiving Holy Communion from him kneel and receive Holy Communion on the Tongue. He seems to also insist on Latin for the Preface dialogue, Preface and Eucharistic prayer and Pater Noster for his Masses even when he uses the vernacular for other parts.
He has indicated, I believe before he came to be pope, that the commission that formulated the revision of the Mass fabricated it rather than promoting an “organic development.” I’m not sure he has said this after he became pope though. He certainly celebrates the Ordinary Form of the Mass exclusively, by the book and its rubrics. He hasn’t celebrated the Extraordinary Form. Lay participation in the ministry of lector is maintained and also for the Universal Prayer and offertory procession. He allows for commentary and greetings before the Penitential Rite and After the Prayer after Holy Communion, an especially long and raucous form of it after the Prayer after Communion at the Mass in Milan with over 1 million people. That Mass was a combination of vernacular and Latin, official chants and more modern idioms of music. I think what is implied in much of what he does is that there is a hierarchy of authority in Vatican II and post Vatican II decrees and developments with the Liturgy. In other words he has created a very fluid situation for the Church and her bishops to move along an “organic development” of the “reform of the reform” in continuity and has even encouraged priests and local congregations to implement some of what he has modeled by the very fact that he does what he does as a form of modeling what he hopes for the rest of the Church as it regards the liturgy. He doesn’t require rigid uniformity and actively encourages a variety of “rites” in the Latin Rite, including the older forms and the new Anglican Rite. That’s very progressive.
What is usually brought up in these cases (and what Fr. Allan seems to allude to above) is this passage from Ratzinger’s preface to the French edition of Gamber’s book on the reform of the liturgy:
J.A. Jungmann, one of the truly great liturgists of our century, defined the liturgy of his time, such as it could be understood in the light of historical research, as a ‘liturgy which is the fruit of development…. What happened after the Council was something else entirely: in the place of liturgy as the fruit of development came fabricated liturgy. We abandoned the organic, living process of growth and development over the centuries, and replaced it–as in a manufacturing process–with a fabrication, a banal on- the-spot product.
This is typically presented as a critique of the reformed liturgy. I myself see no evidence of this in the text itself. I suspect that it refers to some of the more creative experimentation that took place after the Council, not to the official reform. I myself experienced some of this creative experimentation while living in Europe — Eucharistic prayers written by liturgy committees, scripture reading replaced by UNESCO reports, etc.) and found it pretty banal.
Does the Pope think the reformed liturgy could have been better and that in some places it went too far? Probably. Does he dismiss it as “a fabrication, a banal on- the-spot product”? I don’t think so. After all, he celebrates it every day.
Joe OLeary
A pious woman asked me today if she is the only person who feels distraught at the new translation of the Mass. The faithful are suffering from the horrible language, and the way Benedict’s Vatican have thrust its jackboot in their faces. Christ’s little ones deserve better. It is the birthright of all Christians to be allowed to pray in meaningful language. Fatuous balloons of vanity have imposed their bizarre linguistic predilections on people of truer and deeper faith than theirs. The English speaking bishops have slept on the job, and made themselves guilty of criminal pastoral negligence.
Brigid Rauch
I’ve seen this response to the new missal as well, not an organized opposition so much as an ongoing series of spontaneous comments to the effect of “WHAT did he just say?”
What are the main targets of his criticism? [At whom] is his criticism directed?
Fr. Joe, how does your comment address the questions Fr. Ruff has posed? It sounds more like criticism of Pope Benedict and the English-speaking bishops, rather than commentary on Pope Benedict’s criticisms of the liturgy.
Anthony Ruff
Thanks, Jeffrey. I also wondered how JO’L’s comments fit the question at hand. Which is, everyone, your analysis of Pope Benedict’s criticism and at whom he directs it.
awr
M. Jackson Osborn
JO’L –
Am I the only one who doesn’t feel distraught at the new translation of the mass?
Too, I know quite a lot of faithful who are NOT suffering from the horrible language.
If I WERE distraught, and all these people WERE suffering, I suppose that you would then feel that we were deserving of ‘pastoral consideration’.
Actually, I can groan as well as you at some of the bloopers we have been dealt; but, for me, this is just endemically Roman Catholic: it was awful in ’73, it was no better in ’98, and it’s a disappointment now, although what we have now is better than what we had.
If they ever got it right, then people would grumble that it sounded Anglican.
Father Allan J. McDonald
The new translation is absolutely a non issue in my parish and all the laity’s parts have been well assimilated. That doesn’t close the doors to future organic refinements though. Buy no hysteria here or wringing of hands.
Richard Weeks
Fr. Allan, from your posts on this site it is clear to me that, were I one of your parishioners, I would never bring or have brought my concerns about this translation and its implications for the Church to you. In all of your posts that I have read, I’ve detected only the barest shred of empathy for those of us who view this change with profound sadness or even anger.
So, in statistical terms, I would say that your sample suffers from a selection bias; if your parishioners fear reprisal or even just curt dismissal they will not engage you on this topic.
Go to his blog – you will really be disheartened. The epitome of what Yves Congar in the just posted blog with his newly translated Journal calls “integralist”. Click on the Journal link and go to the third introduction by Paul Philibert, OP.
Most of us who are adults, Richard, know that reading someone is very one dimensional, living with, hearing and knowing someone is multidimensional. Your perception of me is the problem of the virtual world and I fear that our young who are more engaged in this kind of technology will only have one-dimensional knowledge of people because of the technology they use so well.
Brendan McInerny
As Fritz has already indicated, the main target of Benedict’s criticism seems to be the perception that in the reforms/their implementation, “We abandoned the organic, living process of growth and development over the centuries, and replaced it–as in a manufacturing process–with a fabrication, a banal on- the-spot product.” But as Fr. Allan has also indicated, this has resulted in rather few legislative measures.
Broadly speaking, I think what Benedict is aiming at is a (perceived) ‘liturgical ethos’ out of line with the (perceived) liturgical ethos of the Church’s history. While this idea of liturgical ethos is incredibly vague, it may be a better tool than judging liturgical changes according to ‘organic development’ or ‘fabrication’. These two categories are less than helpful when dealing with any liturgical history because when changes occur, we can presume that someone willfully made the change. Is it only organic if we don’t know who did this or why? Why are the liturgical reforms prior to Vatican II ‘organic’ while those of the council or perhaps after are ‘fabricated’?
Using ‘ethos’ may allow for one to completely accept the reforms of the council (as Benedict does, at least in action), but still criticize some ‘experimentation’ (but of course, some experimentation might very well be of the proper ethos). This ethos may also allow for a real critique of the state of liturgy prior to the council too (i.e. a rushed, inaudible low-mass). Again, this is a vague concept that I don’t claim to have down, but it may prove fruitful in discussion.
Joe – Perhaps ‘ethos’ might also help clarify what understanding of ‘meaningful’ is most applicable to the style of language used in liturgy? I fully agree that the current translation is deeply flawed, but I’m not ‘meaningful’ is the best standard to use, because of course, many do find the current translation ‘meaningful’ for some of the reasons I suspect you and I dislike.
Karl Liam Saur
The problem is that Trent effectively killed that ethos by preserving the liturgy in amber. (That, btw, was a modern, rationalistic impulse at work in the Tridentine era.) Experimentation is, descriptively, part and parcel of recovering that ethos (it doesn’t mean all experimentation is [insert approving adjective of choice here]).
Brendan McInerny
What ethos did Trent kill?
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your assessment of what Trent was doing in its reforms (i.e. ‘preserving it in amber,’ – though I’m guessing they thought of it more as eliminating ‘false’ historical accretions), but I’m not so sure I would agree that Trent killed the ethos of the liturgy. In fact, what little I have in mind, isn’t something that a council could actually ‘kill’. I’m probably misreading you, but that kind of declaration sounds analogous to the kind of comments those who reject the reforms of Vatican II make – “It (the Council) broke the unbroken tradition of the Roman Catholic Church and the only option is to reject the council’s teachings.”
So your statement that Trent killed the ethos would require, at least for me, some clarification on what it is that Trent eliminated that is part of (or the entirety of) the proper ethos – at least to you. Couldn’t a counterargument could be claimed that the reforms of Trent, like those of Vatican II, attempted to revive the proper ethos of the liturgy after “the wickedness of time or the corruption and carelessness of people” obscured it, yes? According to you, why would that be a faulty argument? Is it the act of conciliar reform that is itself that kills the ethos? Or is it something more specific?
Brendan McInerny
Some hastily written sentences, there. Sorry for the errors.
Karl Liam Saur
I am talking about a liturgical ethos where organic development can occur. When you freeze the liturgy pretty much in place, you kill such an ethos. The effect was partly intentional, partly unintended. Once you’ve frozen and centralized decisionmaking about liturgical change, and decreed that change that does not come from above is not licit, then organic development cannot occur in any meaningful sense of that term. In this way, Trent purchased this problem.
Brendan McInerny
Ah. I understand better what you mean now.
I too think the increased centralization of decision making power is a lamentable characteristic of modern and contemporary Catholic liturgical sensibilities. I would only say that ‘organic development’ might not be a component of liturgical ethos, or at least not a central component – if only because, as I mentioned in my post above, development in liturgy is only very distantly analogous to the development of a living body. When changes occur in the liturgy, even on a very small scale, someone with some kind of authority chose to effect a change. Why such small scale versions of this qualify as ‘organic’ while large scale conciliar reforms do not seems nonsensical to me.
I’ve heard comments like this from my Orthodox colleagues before, but what seems unclear is how any centralized reform can be admitted as acceptable. And if they can never be acceptable, what then is the living member of Church to do? Become Old Believers or attempt to reconstruct a pre-Tridentine/Carolingian/Nicene liturgy? Are we to skip over x centuries of Church history in order to find a pure, organically developed expression of Christian faith?
At certain points in its history, and from quite early on, the Church has deemed centralized legislation of the celebration of the liturgy necessary. Apparently ‘organic development’ doesn’t always cut it (at least in the Church’s historical eyes) and that’s why I think its a flimsy concept for these kinds of discussions.
Jim McKay
I don’t think SP had much to do with liturgy. It was primarily concerned with reconciling with the SSPX. There may have been an element of restoring the reputation of the traditional rite which was being held captive by the SSPX.
Translation issues are another matter. I do not undertand them, and I find it hard to believe he supported, or did not oppose, the guidelines in LA. I doubt that he wants to overrule the decisions made before he became Pope. (he undoubtedly was one of those involved in making those decisions then, but that does not mean he agreed with the entirety of them.)
The decision to accept dissatisfied Anglicans is probably a liturgical decision, ie a reaffirmation of the invalidity of Anglican Orders. This makes a statement about the nature of liturgy that has profound implications that are largely being ignored, but its original impetus is probably dogmatic.
Jim – agree somewhat with what you say. Predicate that upon the debate going on around B16’s Advent “hermeneutic” talk. Would suggest that the context and background of his comments have to do with the ongoing and personal desire on his part to make peace with the SSPX.
When I have stated that some seem to run with his brief talk and draw up some type of “new liturgical universe” – it merely feels like they are taking one talk and running wild – so, organic, rupture, continuity seems to undergird their need to justify two forms of one rite; take the word “continuity” and use it to justify any pre-VII liturgy e.g. ad orientem, latin, TLM, you name it. Now, we are going to see “mutual enhancement”. If the SSPX was the driving force behind his comments, then it would suggest that the reform of the reform has not understood his “indult” or his liturgical directions.
Yet, if you ever watch papal masses, B16 himself never does the EF – why not? why aren’t we paying attention to that if we feel that all decision revolve around the pope?
Jim McKay
When I rea the article by Dulles that Shane suggested, I realized that BXVI was not starting from scratch in his statement on continuity and rupture. It goes back to the 1985 Synod: It is not licit to separate the pastoral character from the doctrinal vigor of the documents. In the same way, it is not legitimate to separate the spirit and the letter of the Council. Moreover, the Council must be understood in continuity with the great tradition of the Church, and at the same time we must receive light from the Council’s own doctrine for today’s Church and the men of our time. The Church is one and the same throughout all the councils.
While criticizing some excesses on the patoral side, he was correcting the attitude you are criticizing. Some rupture is a part of reform. The current liturgy is in continuity with our past, and cannot be repudiated. Any hermeneutic that sees only rupture at VII, like that of SSPX, has made a grave mistake.
So my impression is that many are taking one talk and running wild with it so people do not use it against them. The pope belieeves heartily in the refroms from the Council, and even more heartily in the need for the pope to be respected. My approach would be to use that one speech to argue that our current liturgy is continuity and refversion to the recent past is a rupture. That means finding the continuity that is more important than ritualism and nostalgia.
Agree wholeheartedly with this, Jim. Also, it is echoed by the work of Fr. Komonchak. But, don’t bet that folks such as Fr. Allan will buy into your approach or explanation.
M. Jackson Osborn
JMcK –
Do you really intend, by your use of the adjective ‘dissatisfied’, to view Anglicans who have reconciled with the Catholic Church and are now Anglican Use Catholics in a purely negative and rather unfavourable light? We are quite positive about our situation, and far from being dissatisfied, have viewed our journey as nothing but a positive movement from beginning to end. It is fulfillment for a people who always yearned for a rapprochement between Canterbury and Rome, and realised that such was not going to happen because of developments in the Anglican Communion which, rather than making rapprochement possible, aggravated any thought of it.
Too, your assessment of Anglicanorum coetibus as merely a reaffirmation of the invalidity of Anglican orders is, while it may be said to accomplish that implicitly, I think, an over-simplification. Most of us had thought that this was a pastoral act, and the fruit of genuine oecumenism which would have been unthinkable but for Vatican II. My own personal views about Anglican orders are that some of them are most likely
unquestionably valid and some aren’t, this owing to the variety of lineages (and intent) within Anglicanism. Too, I think that, for complex political as well as doctrinal and theological reasons, it is almost a necessity for Rome to pour cold water on even the best of Anglicanism that it wouldn’t think of pouring on the Orthodox. At any rate, the direction in which Anglicanism is headed makes this debate moot at best. (My thinking here is actually in flux, and your comments [or those of others] would be welcome.)
Jim McKay
I struggled with the word “dissatisfied” but decided to leave it. What would you use?
Of the issues I mentioned, AC is the only one that I think is really liturgical in motivation. It allows people who had no true liturgy to have one, in their own language. (at least that is how I think BXVI sees it) The rest of us have an English translation of the Roman Rite; the ex-Anglicans are allowed their own native English ritual. He institutionalizes the papal ties of the new groups by tying them to the Pope as a replacement for the “uniform text.”
There is an old papal saying “What a pope can do, a pope can undo.” Most people do not understand this. In terms of the current discussion, the papacy can fabricate what it likes while Anglicans and Orthodox have to endure an organic process. Fabrication is a neccesary component of papal authority however much it is restrained by tradition and faith. Change can come mor quickly among Roman Catholics because of papal power, and becoming a Roman Catholic entails accepting that capacity for “quick” change in place of the back and forth in less centralized communities.
When I say “Anglican Orders” I am not talking about lineages and history, but about the validity of the Eucharist. It is the chief ecumenical problem and AC does nothing to solve it. It makes it worse in many ways, rolling back ecumenism to the 50s when the pope learned theology. I hope that you and other Anglicans who join our church are able to overcome the obstacles it proposes. Judging by your comments about the state of the Anglican churches today, I see us only going back to the divides of our past instead of learning from one another.
Richard Malcolm
“It was primarily concerned with reconciling with the SSPX.”
There’s plenty of evidence that the SSPX was a secondary consideration in his motives for issuing the motu proprio.
Most of the young priests and seminarians that I know – at least in the U.S. – have a serious interest in the traditional mass. I don’t think that the Pope is unaware of that. Or that he didn’t anticipate the development – one which might, in the long run, allow both missals to be, as he put it, “mutually enriching.”
Jim McKay
What do you consider to be evidence that SSPX is not the principal target of SP? This is a sincere question. I really am open to changing my mind on this.
I am of two minds about this. While there is a small but enthusiastic group of laity and clergy in communion with the Roman rite who are attached to the extraordinary form, the number of SSPX members is just as large, if not larger in number.
I am convinced that SP was intended for both groups, but with the accent falling on enticements to bring the SSPX back into the fold. Pope Benedict’s half-measures about the Good Friday bidding prayers, for example, appear to be pitched towards the SSPX who do not accept Nostra Aetate. My only disappointment with SP is its implicit downplay of conciliar documents and teachings. If the SSPX wishes to return, it has to accept the plain-meaning of the conciliar teachings. No pope should minimize conciliar teachings to attract those who have intentionally distanced themselves from post-conciliar Catholicism.
Jonathan Day
I will go further than Jordan and say that the reconciliation of the SSPX would be a deeply destructive move. I pray that Pope Benedict turns away from this harmful course.
It would bring in a militant group that believes, among other things, that the normative form of the Mass, the form that the pope himself celebrates exclusively, is — at very best — valid but spiritually toxic to those who participate. A group that would welcome the return of religious compulsion. A group whose antisemitism is covered with the thinnest veil.
The SSPX itself seems to be riven by internal disputes: the line of tension seems to run between the goofy fatwahs of Richard Williamson and the smiling blandishments of Bernard Fellay. At very least they should be given time to resolve these squabbles internally, before bringing them with them into the Church.
Fr. Ron Krisman
Of necessity the reform and renewal of the liturgy after VII had to be “fabricated,” since organic development of the Roman rite had been off limits for a millennium or so. Think of what could have happened had Augustine of Canterbury successfully pleaded for permission to celebrate the divine mysteries in the language(s) of his mission territory! Would a variation of the Roman Rite have developed there just as the Glagolithic Mass (the Roman rite in Old Church Slavonic) developed in the southern Slavic regions?
No, the charge of “fabrication” is an unfair one. The reforms after VII instead were the result of serious study of the sources of our liturgical development. The Church, ever vigilant of the rich store of her tradition, went back to her storehouse and made new some of her ancient treasures.
(Sorry, but I wrote my comment before seeing Karl Liam’s contributions, which are an even fuller expression of the notion of “organic development.”)
Of necessity the reform and renewal of the liturgy after VII had to be “fabricated,” since organic development of the Roman rite had been off limits for a millennium or so.
This is often repeated to the point of being conventional wisdom on both the left and the right, but in fact there was a great deal of development in the Roman Rite between the time of St. Pius V and 1962.
Of the rite itself, or of the setting of the rite (i.e. music, vestments, architecture, additional devotional prayers)? If one excludes the reform of Holy Week (which most true blue trads see as the camel’s nose under the tent anyway), was there much in the way of development of the rite itself? Particularly if one looks to the centuries prior to Pius X?
Great idea, Fr. Ruff – questions from the “people in the pews” – like it.
That being said – have trouble with the approach and context of the questions. And this only adds and contributes to the bi-polar responses. Allow me to explain – all three questions revolve around the “pope” – who he is, what he said, what happened. Would also suggest that one question is biased when it states – “incorrectly implemented”.
Explanation – would suggest that Vatican II tried to ressource a “biblical” understanding of church; thus, moving away from a strict hierarchical or authoritative concept. Its purposes included ecumenism (common baptism, common scripture, common early tradition). Thus, key elements of the council start with the People of God and then the “proper” understanding, ministry, and role of episcopal/papal hierarchy; a common magisterium, etc.
Thus, the question would start with – what did the council say about whatever. Starting with questions about the papal decisions diminishes, if not, skews the fact the VII ennunciated collegiality as a sign from our apostolic legacy – so, SC came from the council who left its development/direction to Paul VI (but not the other way around). Paul empowered the Consilium which was the concilar directive. Practically, SC laid out the directive that episcopal conferences were to make liturgical decisions (thus, my feeling about the slant of these questions).
From Yves Congar’s just translated book:
“Congar’s whole life work was put on the line at Vatican II in his personal combat to make the case for an nderstanding of the church that is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, expressed in the lives of all the baptised, oriented toward the mission of the kingdom of God in the world, and a vocation to freedom under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. He knew that the church had to be a living organism, as opposed to a church that was merely a museum of past spiritual treasures.”
“By going back to the early sources, Congar and others represented
a risk for the power structure that conceived the papal office as a monarchy supported by a dictatorial Roman Curia and always inclined to consider anything done in the Vatican as sharing in the infallibility of the pope.
This battle for a living church, exemplified again and again in confrontations
over texts and principles, is the underlying story. All of these elements, and much more, flowed out of the pastoral renewal of the Council and were bitterly contested at the time. Why? It is a question worth asking, especially since an important and powerful minority in the church today is inclined to reverse changes of this sort. This council journal of Yves Congar is revealing in portraying the attitudes and the mechanisms of an ecclesiastical mentality that is crucial to understand, if we are to comprehend present transitions in the life of the church. Congar generally referred to this mentality as ‘intégrisme’, a French word that cannot easily be translated directly into English, although many translators have simply transliterated it as ‘integralism’. intégristes are emotionally attached to the idea of a Christendom invested with a glorious past of kings and bishops working hand-in-hand with the pope—all of them enjoying the authority to impose their views. This is, says Congar, a fatal nostalgia.”
“To understand intégrisme, then, we have to understand it as a mentality that
identifies itself completely with what is old-fashioned and that appeals to hierarchical authority as the justification for its point of view. It is an instinct to choose what was done before over what is struggling for new expression. It has little respect for anything that comes from below, but is deeply attached to what comes down from on high. When it is a question of expressing this attitude in religious matters, there are certain characteristic positions typical of this mentality……”
(the next blog – review his journal and the third introduction – the rest can be found in Congar’s Ecclesiastical Subtext: Intransigent Conservatism Paul Philibert OP)
Agree with Deacon Fritz & Fr. Krismann but suggest this because the discussion/debate merely moves to different ground – in addition to the Jungmann insert you could add earlier blogs about B16’s Advent talk on the hermeneutic of reform. So, instead of arguing about reform or rupture whether in or against continuty, we shift to what is the meaning of “organic” or “fabrication” (which is a straw man). Just feel that focusing only on papal announcements misses the point and skews our understanding – it violates the very approach used in Vatican II.
Keep in mind that there are those of us who don’t see organic development as the highest principle of Catholic worship. It is a pastoral principle, to be sure. But SC touted a few other more important points.
I have three books by Ratzinger that touch upon the liturgy: Milestones, The Feast of Faith, and The Spirit of the Liturgy. I’ll try to pull out quotes from each, putting each quote in its own comment to facilitate organized conversation. (I hope this does not break the commenting policy.)
“It would not have occurred to any of the Fathers to see in [Sac. Conc.] a ‘revolution’ signifying the ‘end of the Middle Ages’, as some theologians felt they should interpret it subsequently. The work was seen as a continuation of the reforms introduced by Pius X and carried on carefully but resolutely by Pius XII. General expressions such as ‘the liturgical books should be revised as soon as possible’ were understood in this sense: as the uninterrupted continuation of that development which had always been there and which, since Pius X and XII, had received a definite profile from the rediscovery of the classical Roman liturgical traditions, which was, of course, to overcome certain tendencies of Baroque liturgy and 19th century devotional piety and to promote a new humble and sober centering of the authentic mystery of Christ’s presence in his Church. In this context it is not surprising that the ‘model Mass’ now proposed, which was supposed to (and in fact did) take the place of the traditional Ordo missae, was in 1967 rejected by the majority of the Fathers who had been called together to a special synod on the matter.” (Milestones, 123)
Second, a puzzling thing in this passage is the parenthetical “(and in fact did).” The “model Mass” that was tried out in 1967 was in fact significantly different from what we ended up with eventually — much more “stripped down.” So I’m not sure what the Pope is saying here.
You’re welcome; I’ll be putting up quotes from The Spirit of the Liturgy later today.
Is there a resource online that shows what the order of the “normative Mass” presented at the 1967 Synod was? I have read elsewhere that the “normative Mass” and the Missal of 1969 are substantially the same, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a detailed account of the 1967 text… if I have, it was probably in Bugnini’s The Reform of the Liturgy, but that was a library loan and I don’t have it at hand.
Joshua Vas
JP – there is not, to my knowledge. I’m not sure how exactly email exchange would work since this is a public thread– but I have some scans I could send you.
In general, the 1967 schema is practically the same as the 1969 Ordo Missae. The main differences are in rubrics – several things were still somewhat up in the air, such as the position of a penitential rite, etc. To give an example, a proposal is either Kyrie OR Gloria, but not both. But in general, all the texts of the 1969 are more or less there, in the same order. There are a few oddities: the Indulgentiam and Quid retribuam are retained, the Blessing is still placed after the Dismissal. The main textual-ritual difference is at the Preparation of the Gifts, where the prayers and rites are very different (the prayers are a Didache and Proverbs inspired version). The Eucharistic Prayers also show certain variations from their final forms although they are largely the same. The 5th EP, inspired by the Egyptian Basil anaphora, is not yet nixed.
“… the publication of the Missal of Paul VI, which was accompanied by the almost total prohibition, after a transitional phase of only half a year, of using the missal we had had until then. I welcomed the fact that now we had a binding liturgical text after a period of experimentation that had often deformed the liturgy. But I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy. The previous missal had been created by Pius V in 1570 in connection with the Council of Trent; and so it was quite normal that, after four hundred years and a new council, a new pope would present us with a new missal. But the historical truth of the matter is different.
“Pius V had simply ordered a reworking of the Missale Romanum then being used, which is the normal thing as history develops over the course of centuries. Many of his successors had likewise reworked this missal again, but without ever setting one missal against another. It was a continual process of growth and purification in which continuity was never destroyed. There is no such thing as a ‘Missal of Pius V’ created by Pius V himself. There is only the reworking done by Pius V as one phase in a long history of growth. […]
“It was reasonable and right of the [2nd Vatican] Council to order a revision of the missal such as had often taken place before and which this time had to be more thorough than before, above all because of the introduction of the vernacular.
“But more than this now happened: the old building was demolished, and another was built, to be sure largely using materials from the previous one and even using the old building plans. There is no doubt that this new missal in many respects brought with it a real improvement and enrichment; but setting it as a new construction over against what had grown historically, thereby makes the liturgy appear to be no longer a living development but the product of erudite work and juridical authority; this has caused us enormous harm.
“For then the impression had to emerge that liturgy is something ‘made’, not something given in advance but something lying within our own power of decision. From this it also follows that we are not to recognize the scholars and the central authority alone as decision makers, but that in the end each and every ‘community’ must provide itself with its own liturgy. When liturgy is self-made, however, then it can no longer give us what its proper gift should be: the encounter with the mystery that is not our own product but rather our origin and the source of our life. A renewal of liturgical awareness, a liturgical reconciliation that again recognizes the unity of the history of the liturgy and that understands Vatican II, not as a breach, but as a stage of development: these things are urgently needed for the life of the Church.
“I am convinced that the crisis in the Church that we are experiencing today [1997] is to a large extent due to the disintegration of the liturgy, which at times has even come to be conceived of etsi Deus non daretur: in that it is a matter of indifference whether or not God exists and whether or not he speaks to us and hears us. But when the community of faith, the worldwide unity of the Church and her history, and the mystery of the living Christ are no longer visible in the liturgy, where else, then, is the Church to become visible in her spiritual essence? Then the community is celebrating only itself, an activity that is utterly fruitless.
“And, because the ecclesial community cannot have its origin from itself but emerges as a unity only from the Lord, through faith, such circumstances will inexorably result in a disintegration into sectarian parties of all kinds — partisan opposition within a Church tearing herself apart. This is why we need a new Liturgical Movement, which will call to life the real heritage of the Second Vatican Council.” (Milestones, 146-149)
Then the community is celebrating only itself, an activity that is utterly fruitless.
This is one of my disappointments with many “major event” Masses I have seen or participated in. Even bishops who are generally conservative on liturgical matters seem to indulge in making some Masses into a meeting of the local chapter of the Ain’t It Great To Be Catholic club. I’m not against celebrating human accomplishments, I would just rather let the Mass be the Mass and keep the glad-handing and showboating and thank you speeches for later.
Sadly, even the pope celebrates (or gets roped into) liturgies that suffer from this problem. I imagine he would prefer less interruptions in the Masses he celebrates, less virtuoso performances, etc.
Ratzinger’s description of the nature of the Tridentine liturgical reform, and its comparison to the liturgical reform following Vatican II, is retold in similar words in The Feast of Faith pages 85-87. In particular:
“With all its advantages, the new Missal was published as if it were a book put together by professors, not a phase in a continual growth process. Such a thing has never happened before. It is absolutely contrary to the laws of liturgical growth, and it has resulted in the nonsensical notion that Trent and Pius V had ‘produced’ a Missal four hundred years ago. The Catholic liturgy was thus reduced to the level of a mere product of modern times.” (The Feast of Faith, 86)
On the one hand, I think the Pope has a valid point that liturgical change had probably never occurred as rapidly as it did after Vatican II, and the result (in combination with many other things) sent people reeling.
On the other hand, a revision of the Missal in the context of modern rapid communications and the growth of historical scholarship had also never occurred before. Should the Church not have availed itself of that scholarship? those means of communication? What would the alternative be?
On the other hand, a revision of the Missal in the context of modern rapid communications and the growth of historical scholarship had also never occurred before.
Was the situation that much different in 1970 than in 1960?
Dunstan Harding
If the missal of Pius V replaced all other western, local missals (something I don’t believe had ever happened before in the Roman rite), then wasn’t this missal “produced” by the Council? Before Trent wasn’t there a missal used in Paris from about 1474 and one used in the papal court which served as the model for Pius’ missal? If so, isn’t this Tridentine text what one could call an “on the spot” liturgy?
Trent abolished a number of practices of a purely local nature. Out went the farced Kyrie and Gloria. Uniform vestment colors are imposed. Out went the enclosed sanctuaries and rood screens/the pulpitum? I think a French form of the offertory prayers was adopted.
Thomas Dalby
No, Dunstan, Trent preserved Uses that were more than 200 years old at the date of the Council: Sarum lived on in recusant use, as did the Gallican rites until the end of the 18th century; not to mention the Ambrosian, Mozarabic, Carthusian, Dominican, Carmelite and Braga Uses.
Jim McKay
, because the ecclesial community cannot have its origin from itself but emerges as a unity only from the Lord, through faith, such circumstances will inexorably result in a disintegration into sectarian parties of all kinds — partisan opposition within a Church tearing herself apart. This is why we need a new Liturgical Movement, which will call to life the real heritage of the Second Vatican Council.”
What?
To preven “disintegration into. Sectarian parties” we need a new party?
Unity is “from the Lord, through faith” so let’s get together to accomplish it? Isn’t that like a rallying cry “we can’t do anything, so let’s go do it!”??
“Liturgy has a cosmic and universal dimension. The community does not become a community by mutual interaction. It receives its being as a gift from an already existing completeness, totality, and in return it gives itself back to this totality. […] This is why liturgy cannot be ‘made’. It has to be simply received as a given reality and continually revitalized. This is why its universality is expressed in a form binding on the whole Church, committed to the local congregation in the form of the ‘rite’. As ‘feast’, liturgy goes beyond the realm of what can be made and manipulated; it introduces us to the realm of given, living reality, which communicates itself to us. This is why, at all times and in all religions, the fundamental law of liturgy has been the law of organic growth within the universality of the common tradition.
“Even in the huge transition from the Old to the New Testament, this rule was not breached, the continuity of liturgical development was not interrupted: Jesus introduced his words at the Last Supper organically into the Jewish liturgy at the point where it was open to them, as it were, waiting for them. The growing Church carefully continued this process of inwardly deepening, purifying and expanding the Old Testament inheritance. Neither the apostles nor their successors ‘made’ a Christian liturgy; it grew organically as a result of the Christian reading of the Jewish inheritance, fashioning its form as it did so. {See L. Bouyer, Eucharistie. Theologie et spiritualite de la priere eucharistique (Tournai 1966)} […]
“In this sense liturgy always imposed an obligatory form on the individual congregation and the individual celebrant. […] The obligatory character of the essential parts of the liturgy also guarantees the true freedom of the faithful: it makes sure that they are not victims of something fabricated by an individual or group, that they are sharing in the same liturgy that binds the priest, the bishop and the pope. In the liturgy, we are all given the freedom to appropriate, in our own personal way, the mystery which addresses us.
“It is also worth observing here that the ‘creativity’ involved in manufactured liturgies has a very restricted scope. It is poor indeed compared with the wealth of the received liturgy in its hundreds and thousands of years of history. Unfortunately, the originators of homemade liturgies are slower to become aware of this than the participants. Furthermore, those able to draw up such liturgies are necessarily few in number, with the results that what is ‘freedom’ for them means ‘domination’ as it affects others.” (The Feast of Faith, 66-68)
It seems to me that here the Pope is criticizing not so much the official reform, as the creative local adaptations that followed upon it (“Hey, let’s replace the penitential rite with snippets from the New York Time“). Of course part of his point, which he made in another of the quotations above, is that the degree of change brought about by the official reform encouraged an attitude of “hey, if those guys in Rome can make up a liturgy, why can’t we here in Scarsdale?”
“Lamentably, the magnificent work done in [the field of interiorization of the liturgy and of liturgical formation] by men like Romano Guardini and Pius Parsch has been thrown into the wastepaper basket with the advent of new books. Thank God there are signs that the inheritance bequeathed by these great liturgical teachers is being rediscovered and carried forward. True liturgical formation cannot be achieved by a continual stream of new ideas and new forms. We need to be led from the form to the content. In other words, we need an education which will help us to grow into an inner appropriation of the Church’s common liturgy. This is the only way to get beyond the profusion of words and explanations which tear the liturgy to pieces and ultimately explain nothing.” (The Feast of Faith, 70-71)
I tend to agree with him here, but would simply note that many of the efforts of advocates of the Reform of the Reform, not to mention the new translation, are experienced by the people in the pews as “a continual stream of new ideas and new forms.” The liturgical fidgets that plague us are perpetrated as much by reformers on the right as by those on the left.
“I must add, though it conflicts with the accepted view, that it is not essential for the entire canon of the Mass to be recited aloud on every occasion. The idea that it must rests on a misunderstanding of its nature as proclamation. Where a community has undergone the requisite process of liturgical education, the congregation is well acquainted with the component parts of the Church’s eucharistic prayer. In such a case it is only necessary to pray aloud the first few words of each section of the prayer — the headings, as it were; in this way the congregation’s participation (and hence the quality of proclamation) will be often far greater than when its internal appropriation of the words is stifled by an uninterrupted loud recitation.
“The unhappy multiplication of eucharistic prayers which we see in other countries and which has long been under way here too [in Germany] is symptomatic of a very serious situation […] the demand for ‘variety’ [which is] insatiable, however much these eucharistic prayers may proliferate.” (The Feast of Faith, 72-73)
Sorry, but the first paragraph strikes me as nonsensical. The great advocate of liturgical continuity is here advocating a practice that, to my knowledge, is without precedent. The end of silent prayers have been said aloud, but the beginning? And the idea that the “internal appropriation of the words is stifled” by actually hearing the words spoken? The Pope is a very good theologian, but quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus.
It is not completely without precedent: the words “Nobis quoque peccatoribus” of the Canon are said aloud. Granted, that was for a different purpose than Ratzinger was proposing, but it was done.
I don’t find the idea that outlandish — I find it very difficult (at times) to do anything other than listen to the words being spoken by the priest when they are being spoken aloud; I have trouble meditating on them, “riffing” on them in my own silent prayer, etc. I think Ratzinger’s idea is akin to saying “Blessed is the man” or “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” or “The Lord is my shepherd” and letting the informed listener fill in the rest.
I have to admit that I have grown to appreciate the quiet canon over the last five years of celebrating the EF Mass. At first I was quite uncomfortable with it, but now realize that it has some strength to it. The Orate Fratres (the two words) also are said out loud with the remainder quiet. Of course one can now say the canon quietly in the EF but if wearing a microphone it is heard. However, I still contend that we have to read Cardinal Ratzinger in an unofficial way using personal opinion to make a point, not teaching what should be done, but proposing and what Pope Benedict does and teaches which has a different authority although obviously there are different levels of papal authority. His style of praying the Canon today (and I’ve heard him pray 1,2 and 3 is to read it dispassionately not as though he is proclaiming it to congregation as a lector reading the Scriptures, but as though he is actually praying it.
Deacon Fritz: Sorry, but the first paragraph strikes me as nonsensical. The great advocate of liturgical continuity is here advocating a practice that, to my knowledge, is without precedent. The end of silent prayers have been said aloud, but the beginning?
This was a very common practice with the Pater Noster in the pre-1962 liturgy e.g. in the absolution after a Requiem and in the office.
As Fr. MacDonald points out, Oratre Fratres is another example. So too the priest’s “Domine non sum dignus…” I believe, though I’m not 100% certain without checking.
Jeffrey: It is not completely without precedent: the words “Nobis quoque peccatoribus” of the Canon are said aloud.
Jeffrey, I was going to write that too, but note that, as Fritz points out, that’s the end of a silent prayer, not the beginning.
Samuel, I thought by “the end of silent prayers” he was referring specifically to things like “… in saecula saeculorum” or “… per Christum Dominum nostrum.”
I consider the “Nobis quoque” to be different because it is the first group of words of a longer prayer (within a prayer). I know that these words were said aloud as a signal to minor clerics that the Canon was winding down, but the fact remains that the opening words of a sub-prayer were chosen, rather than the closing words of a previous sub-prayer (e.g. “indulgeas, deprecamur” from the Memento etiam).
Jeffrey, you’re right, I misread your comment. Sorry about that!
Dunstan Harding
I’m always amused to hear traditionalists defend the silent recitations of the Roman canon, but then are quick to praise the Mass of Gregory the Great’s as the liturgical ideal.
In Gregory’s day the canon of the Mass was recited out loud. I don’t think there were any offertory prayers at the altar.
I clearly didn’t know what I was talking about with regard to reciting only the beginning of prayers (I actually know about the things that people mentioned, but clearly that part of my brain was not engaged). I still think the reason given for his suggestion doesn’t hold water.
Karl Liam Saur
+1 Fritz. The argument for the mostly silent canon is a stack of rationalizations, express or implied, that are not very persuasive.
Ratzinger re-addresses this issue in The Spirit of the Liturgy pages 214-216. In particular:
“In 1978, to the annoyance of many liturgists, I said that in no sense does the whole Canon always have to be said out loud. […] It is no accident that in Jerusalem, from a very early time, parts of the Canon were prayed in silence and that in the West the silent Canon — overlaid in part with meditative singing — became the norm. To dismiss all this as the result of misunderstandings is just too easy. It really is not true that reciting the whole EP out loud and without interruptions is a prerequisite for the participation of everyone in this central act of the Mass.
“My suggestion in 1978 was as follows. First, liturgical education ought to aim at making the faithful familiar with the essential meaning and fundamental orientation of the Canon. Secondly, the first words of the various prayers should be said out loud as a kind of cue for the congregation, so that each individual in his silent prayer can take up the intonation and bring the personal into the communal and the communal into the personal.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 214-215)
Dunstan Harding
It is no accident that in Jerusalem, from a very early time, parts of the Canon were prayed in silence and that in the West the silent Canon — overlaid in part with meditative singing — became the norm.
————————————–
I don’t know how “early” cardinal Ratzinger had in mind, but I think well into the 5th century most of the anaphora was recited. The Copts still chant most of their anaphora of St. Basil.
“Liturgy does not come about through regulation. One of the weaknesses of the postconciliar liturgical reform can doubtless be traced to the armchair strategy of academics, drawing up things on paper which, in fact, would presuppose years of organic growth. The most blatant example of this is the reform of the Calendar: those responsible simply did not realize how much the various annual feasts had influenced Christian people’s relation to time. In redistributing these established feasts throughout the year according to some inconsistently applied historical arithmetic, they ignored a fundamental law of religious life.” (The Feast of Faith, 81-82)
“In the wake of the Council a lot of things happened far too quickly and abruptly, with the result that many of the faithful could not see the inner continuity with what had gone before. In part it is simply a fact that the Council was pushed aside. For instance, it had said that the language of the Latin Rite was to remain Latin, although suitable scope was to be given to the vernacular. Today we might ask: Is there a Latin Rite at all any more? Certainly there is not awareness of it. To most people the liturgy seems to be rather something for the individual congregation to arrange. Core groups make up their own ‘liturgies’ from week to week, with an enthusiasm which is as amazing as it is misplaced. […] The distinctions between liturgy and conviviality, liturgy and society, are blurred. Thus many priests, following the etiquette of polite society, feel that they must not receive Communion until all the other has been ‘served’; or they no longer feel able to say ‘I bless you‘ and so dissolve the basic liturgical relationship between priest and people.” (The Feast of Faith, 84-85)
Again, he seems to be making the point is that the problem with the official reform is not so much what it produced directly (though that is not above criticism — see his remarks above about the calendar as well as the quotation Jeff gives following this one — but rather what it produced indirectly: an anarchic creativity.
The critique seems two-pronged. One the one hand, “regulation” by experts is bad because it is not organic. On the other hand, grassroots developments are bad because they are anarchic. It seems as if the idea of organic development is intended to rein in the anarchy without empowering liturgical experts to tinker with the liturgy. I’m not convinced, however, that this gives you anything more than total stasis.
Jack Rakosky
The critique seems two-pronged. One the one hand, “regulation” by experts is bad because it is not organic. On the other hand, grassroots developments are bad because they are anarchic. It seems as if the idea of organic development is intended to rein in the anarchy without empowering liturgical experts to tinker with the liturgy. I’m not convinced, however, that this gives you anything more than total stasis.
My suspicion is that Benedict may have been influenced by Newman and the idea of development of doctrine.
From my little knowledge of Newman, my understanding of Newman’s notion was that by repeatedly thinking about an idea we are able to bring out all its implications and actually come to understand it better than we did at first. In that way Newman kept the notion of continuity, the idea was really there in the beginning, however there was change, we understand it and its implications more fully.
I suspect Benedict thinks that our organic development of the liturgy should always be bringing out more fully a reality which was there in the beginning, and hence in some ways all editions of the Missal are really editions of a kind of ideal Missal that was there implicitly in the beginning.
Karl Liam Saur
Fritz, he also overstates how much discontinuity was perceived. It’s a natural overstatement, because those who perceived it will tend to be a lot louder than those who did not, and his experience of this shift was primarily as a cleric, not as a layperson, shall we say. Again, one sees his musings on liturgy are probably better read as watercolors – pay more attention to the the general thrust rather than particular criticisms.
And add to that, his experience is not pastoral – with a couple of year exception (which he spent outside of the diocese more than in the diocese) he has never led an actual pastoral situation – he has never lived and worked in mission lands.
This impacts what he says – his experience is part of the curia; strongly hierarchical/institutional; out of a European mindset; he is not a liturgical expert.
Thomas Dalby
” It’s a natural overstatement, because those who perceived it will tend to be a lot louder than those who did not…”
Sorry, have we come back to the subject of MR3 so quickly?
Bill deHaas
Again – his personal opinion:
“it is simply a fact that the Council was pushed aside. For instance, it had said that the language of the Latin Rite was to remain Latin, although suitable scope was to be given to the vernacular.”
As we now know from the minutes, internal debates, and Consilium – his statement skews the reality and is not nuanced; thus, a false generalization.
This goes along with other commenters noting discrepancies e.g. Paul Inwood’s on “abrogation of former missals”; fabrication; calendar remark (conferences of bishops pushed for this); organic development.
In some ways, his three written works merely express personal opinions and, at times, disappointment with how things developed. Would suggest that many share the thought that there were “unintended consequences” but not sure many would agree with his solutions.
Bill, it is precisely from his opinions and disappointments that we determine what and whom he criticizes regarding the liturgical reform following Vatican II.
Bill deHaas
JP – you repeated what I just said but missed my last point – WHO decides?
Scroll down – you have folks such as Fr. Allan who want to bring back the 1962 missal and begin a process to consolidate the “best elements into a new missal? B16 has created unintended consequences (over episcopal objections) with the SP and those who have blown this out of proportion and his unclear “mutual enhancement”.
Well – VII already did that but if you “re-opened the door”, who would do that? another council? the pope through a committee – geez, another New Translation experience? As you study VII preparatory notes, you can see that numerous committees (ecumenical, ecclesiology, scripture, missions, etc.) weighed in – this goes way beyond just liturgy or CDW. Really wonder what the “worldwide” bishops would say about whether the 1962 missal was abrogated? what would they say about EF and SP? what would they say about “organic”; “fabricated”; etc.
Appears that we are replacing decades of work and conciliar decisions with personal opinions or pressure from small minority groups? Some here don’t want liturgical experts; some do; some want pastoral input but not as far as input from third world liturgical experience? Look at the examples raise here to date – silent canon?; ad orientem?; benedictine style?; kneeling for communion?; how much latin and when/where?; etc.
This comes from the topic just posted by Fr. Ruff – different issue but the process/approach has lots in common as does this bishop’s statement (would substitute “at a standstill” and insert “polarized” for liturgy issue:
“In the spirit of the Council, the Church must come up with a plan. I will certainly not say what, but I do say that we must begin to discuss this seriously… The question cannot be brushed aside any more, but presently everything is at a standstill.”
Bishop Kräutler does not consider a gathering of bishops in Rome to be the appropriate means. He thinks it would make more sense to poll all the bishops of the entire world. “What is your opinion, what do you think of this, what do your people say? Talk to the priests, the religious, the laity. Have a meeting and formulate your opinion.”
The bishop believes that the “pulse of the universal Church” should be taken, and taken seriously. “We believe that the Spirit of God is with all of us, not just with one person.” He advocates forming some sort of committee after the polling, “with the Pope and under the Pope,” which would see whether there is need for a new council or some other representative assembly.”
“Lest there be any misunderstanding, let me add that as far as its content is concerned (apart from a few criticisms), I am very grateful for the new Missal, for the way it has enriched the treasure of prayers and prefaces, for the new EPs and the increased number of texts for use on weekdays, etc., quite apart from the availability of the vernacular. But I do regard it as unfortunate that we have been presented with the idea of a new book rather than with that of continuity within a single liturgical history. In my view, a new edition will need to make it quite clear that the so-called Missal of Paul VI is nothing other than a renewed form of the same Missal to which Pius X, Urban VIII, Pius V and their predecessors have contributed, right from the Church’s earliest history.” (The Feast of Faith, 87)
M. Jackson Osborn
Many thanks, Jeffrey, for these extracts from our Holy Father’s works. They are a potent reminder that there is much more to this pope than the Extra-ordinary Form, or the objects of many of the complaints against him. In fact, when reading his works and teachings, one is rather bemused at all the fault found with him. We should be thankful that we have him. (Nor am I anywhere near to being a partisan of the Tridentine resurgence, and have something akin to contempt for the ultra-montane bent that seems to follow in its wake.) Leaving aside the limited validity of many of the complainants on this blog, they usually remind me of the quip about the old Protestant who was asked if he believed in papal infallibility: his response? ‘Certainly not! Then I would have to give up my own infallibility’. Much fruitful discussion should issue from what you have shared with us. Certainly, a more balanced and rational assessment of Benedicts papacy, ministry, and legacy.
Paul Inwood
Unfortunately Joseph Ratzinger is not a liturgist. Like Gamber, cited above, he is self-taught, and it shows up in statements such as this one, quoted by Jeffrey
I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy.
Against that mis-statement I place this comment of the late liturgical scholar Pierre Jounel, which I think I have quoted before on this blog:
Paul VI followed exactly the same procedure with his Missal as Pius V had with the Missal and Breviary in 1570, Clement VIII in 1595 with the Roman Pontifical, Pius X with the psalter of the Breviary in 1911, and Pius XII with the Holy Week rites in 1955. In all these cases, the previous usage was abrogated and replaced by the new. This is the Church’s constant practice. [My emphasis]
Except its quite a bit more complicated tham that, isn’t it? In the first place, the Tridentine reform didn’t impose complete uniformity.
The revised Pian psalter was in fact optional when it was introduced. The list excludes other reforms (e.g .the Vatican edition of the chant) that were not obligitory.
Paul, I’m not sure how you are defining the term “liturgist,” but I think by most definitions Gamber fits the bill (as much as I disagree with him on some matters).
Richard Malcolm
1. I never cease to be amazed at the credentialism – and that’s really what you’re engaged in here, Mr. Inwood – employed by academic theologians in general and by liturgists in particular to dismiss criticisms of their work, especially from more traditional postures. If once upon a time it was the letters in front of the advocate’s name that matter, now, it seems, it is the letters after it that matter. It’s hardly an improvement.
Joseph Ratzinger is/was a tenured theologian at some of the best schools of theology in Europe, and he has written at some length on topics liturgical, even if it has not been the main focus of his academic career. A blithe dismissal of him as “self-taught,” as “not a liturgist” – and therefore apparently to be disregarded, even setting aside his titles and positions in the Church – gives off the whiff of a new form of clericalism to replace the old.
2. Your substantive point is, as Sam points out, problematic. His points about the Pian psalter and the Pius V missal aside, the fundamental problem is that, psalter aside (which was a fundamentally new psalter), these missals (yes, even the 1955 missal with its Holy Week reforms) were really only very minor revisions of the same missal, and recognizable as such. St. Pius V did not change so much as codify the Roman Rite as it already existed in 1570 (and had existed, with little change, for centuries before).
The Paul VI missal is plainly seen by Ratzinger as something quite new, a new missal altogether, even if it draws from some aspects of the old missals for its structure and prayers. And, reading Paul VI’s proclamation, it seems evident that he viewed it in this manner as well.
Jounel’s comment has applicability only insofar as it relates to the papal authority being deployed to proclaim and require (in any respect) the use of a missal or psalter. Otherwise, these examples have as much in common as cheese and chalk.
Richard Malcolm
One final point: If the writings of Joseph Ratzinger, theologian, seem to evince a view of the Pauline missal as a fundamentally new missal, Joseph Ratzinger the Pope clearly states that the Pauline missal is merely one of two basic forms of the Roman Rite (Summorum Pontificum Art. 1).
This has always struck me, as it has others, as a kind of polite juridical fiction, necessary to make a sufficiently compelling case for the affirmation that the traditional Roman Rite was “never abrogated.” And I suspect that Joseph Ratzinger the Pope believes it to be a juridical fiction. If it is indeed the same Rite, the fact must be confronted that keeping an earlier and a later form of the same Rite is, with a few arguable exceptions, without real precedent in the West. And apparently, the Holy Father did not wish to deal with such an argument in 2007, or at any time since.
Jack Rakosky
Thanks, Jeffrey, for all your work in this.
There are major problems with the organic development metaphor. I wonder if R has addressed some of these.
1. With Karl, I would say that organic stopped in the West with Trent, the invention of the printing press and centralization of government in the Curia. Everything since has been artificial and bureaucratic. The slow piecemeal bureaucratic changes under P12 were not any more organic than the fast paced changes after V2. Indeed all notions of “say the black, do the red,” “that even a priest cannot change anything in the liturgy,” are modern bureaucratic rather than organic growth notions.
2. The Orthodox liturgy still contains some organic features. The very extensive Byzantine Liturgy gets abbreviated by the Bishops and even pastors. The extensive options in the OF is a way of allowing some organic development (adaptation to the environment) within a menu produced by a bureaucracy. Adaptation to the environment is key to a true organic model, and subsidiarity (adaptation through changes at lower levels rather than higher levels) is essential to being organic. Does R have any thoughts on these issues?
3. An organic model must face the problem that there is bad growth along with good growth, and that the bad growth was not simply a matter of “accretions.” Simply said, the West has suffered far more than the East from clericalism which led to the private Mass and the private Divine Office (which still remains even after V2). That clericalism also deprived the people of the resource of Scripture through lack of a vernacular liturgy. What precisely does R think needed to have been reformed about the liturgy and why?
4. The Reform of the Liturgy after V2 brought us the three year cycle of Scripture readings and the common lectionary. This was certainly not organic development; but many people see it as one of the most valuable parts of the liturgical reform. What does R think of the 3 yr cycle?
Thomas Dalby
Is a liturgical context the best place to encounter scripture? My perception of the triennial lectionaries has been that we are given three decontextualised fragments of scripture with a dismembered psalm at Mass: I wouldn’t call the lectionary a triumph of the recovery of scripture.
In the liturgy of the hours we do have the opportunity to engage with the psalms, but their repetition in the context of the liturgy would mean that if we laity participated in the l.o.t.h. in English or Latin the outcome of the encounter would be the same.
The best place to encounter scripture is in reading and study.
The rearrangement of the Kalendar, together with the triennial lectionary has left most of the laity divorced from the liturgical year and no closer to scripture.
On most Sundays, the Psalm responds to the First Reading, which is a foreshadowing of or precursor to the Gospel Reading. The Second Reading is less easy to place, since it is sequentially chosen from the epistles.
However, that’s not always the case on solemnities or Sundays in Advent/Lent/Easter, and the weekday cycle is mostly sequential.
There is a lot that could be done to improve the arrangement of the readings at Mass.
Richard Malcolm
I’ve always thought that the Office is the best place for a regular encounter of scripture.
In the Mass, there is something to be said for . . . depth over breadth.
I have the impression, however, that of the aspects of the Pauline missal that he *is* a fan of is the new three year lectionary. It’s unlikely to go away anytime soon.
Thomas Dalby
Jeffrey,
Yes, I am aware that the selected readings are a work of art: as a combination the epistle and old testament readings always serve to amplify the gospel readings, but how much do we laity (especially when, say, wrangling small children, being distracted by last week’s crisis at work, thinking about the meatloaf in the oven etc) actually digest the feast laid before us at Mass? And the plain fact is, we neither get enough of the texts to give us an appreciation of them nor get familiar with regularly repeated texts for them to be meaningful.
As I said above, I don’t believe that Mass is a context conducive to giving people a familiarity with the breadth of sacred scripture currently included in the lectionary. Speaking personally, I particularly hate the truncated psalms that we are given at Mass.
Karl Liam Saur
Thomas,
You mean the proper antiphons?
Jack Rakosky
The question that I raised was what was R’s opinion of the three year lectionary.
I realized there are some people out there who do not like it; certainly it existence has caused deep trouble for the Propers. On the other hand, many people like myself think it is a very good thing. For many people with that opinion. R’s notion of organic development would be hard to square with such a large positively valued change.
In some ways the change was not so large, depending upon where in history you look. Most liturgical scholars seem to be of the opinion that the lectionary was originally sequential since so many of the Church Fathers wrote so many commentaries on books of the Bible. Is this one of the areas where R rejects going back to earlier practices as a model. Actually what was done was a compromise: the earlier practice of sequential reading for the Epistle and Gospel with the later practice of a non sequential OT reading parallel to the Gospel theme. One could argue that the choice optimized the best of the old and new.
As I commented on the Julia Smucker excellent Contours of the Catholic Mind post
one can get very different opinions of liturgy, all of which take the long view, are both/and, and view tradition as a living process. The lectionary appears to an excellent example.
I would still like to know if R ever voiced an objection to the new lectionary. The new lectionary poses a real problem for organic development unless you accept that you can go back to an earlier stage. Even then, it is quite a change.
Often renewal in the religious life has taken place because of an appeal to an earlier stage in the development of a religious order. In fact V2 specifically asked religious orders to review their mission in light of the founder’s ideals, while talking into account modern conditions and needs. I would call that organic development but R might not.
Bill deHaas
Well stated, Jack. You hit the nail on the head – organic development has meant and looked differently throughout our history. Jungmann’s Mass of the Roman Rite does an excellent job of showing how “organic” development happened – sometimes is was very gradual; other times it was abrupt.
Reading thru JP’s posted excerpts, I only get a confusing read from R – he appears to say contradictory things?
Thanks Jeffrey. I really do believe that most of the complaints about the revised Mass have to do with later “theological” tinkering rather than the actual Mass and its GIRM and rubrics, although many of us feel that the GIRM and rubrics need a little bit more direction for certain things that would close loopholes. But the problem with the Mass, any Mass, EF or OF or whatever is how it is celebrated.
My experience of visiting churches on vacation is abysmal. Lectors are ill prepared, poorly dressed. Altar servers are clueless about what they should do and are a distraction. The priest is too folksy and seems more intent on entertaining rather than praying. There is sloppiness rather than attention to detail. Music is abysmal. New architecture and renovation of old churches leaves much to be desired and is uninspiring. Perhaps Cardinal Ratzinger and his later more official self as Pope is really dealing with what so many of us in the 1970’s and 80’s experienced–we went to workshops, saw unusual things modeled for us at liturgical events celebrated there and dragged them back to the parish. We allowed (I include myself here) so-called experts to direct the implementation of a future view of the liturgy that the 1970 missal never intended if celebrated by the book.
“In 1918, the year that Guardini published his book [The Spirit of the Liturgy], the liturgy was rather like a fresco. It had been preserved from damage, but it had been almost completely overlaid with whitewash by later generations. In the MIssal from which the priest celebrated, the form of the liturgy that had grown from its earliest beginnings was still present, but, as far as the faithful were concerned, it was largely concealed beneath instructions for and forms of private prayer. The fresco was laid bare by the Liturgical Movement and, in a definitive way, by the Second Vatican Council. For a moment its colors and figures fascinated us.
“But since then the fresco has been endangered by climatic conditions as well as by various restorations and reconstructions. In fact, it is threatened with destruction, if the necessary steps are not taken to stop these damaging influences. Of course, there must be no question of its being covered with whitewash again, but what is imperative is a new reverence in the way we treat it, a new understanding of its message and its reality, so that rediscovery does not become the first stage of irreparable loss.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 7-8 [Preface])
“For the Liturgy of the Word is about speaking and responding, and so a face-to-face exchange between proclaimer and hearer makes sense. […] On the other hand, a common turning to the east during the EP remains essential. […]
“Haussling has levelled several objections at these ideas of mine. […] These ideas are alleged to be a romanticism for the old ways, a misguided longing for the past. It is said to be odd that I should speak only of Christian antiquity and pass over the succeeding centuries. Coming as it does from a liturgical scholar, this objection is quite remarkable. As I see it, the problem with a large part of modern liturgiology is that it tends to recognize only antiquity as a source, and therefore normative, and to regard everything developed later, in the Middle Ages and through the Council of Trent, as decadent.
“And so one ends up with dubious reconstructions of the most ancient practice, fluctuating criteria, and never-ending suggestions for reform, which lead ultimately to the disintegration of the liturgy that has evolved in a living way. On the other hand, it is important and necessary to see that we cannot take as our norm the ancient in itself and as such, nor must we automatically write off later developments as alien to the original form of the liturgy. There can be a thoroughly living kind of development in which a seed at the origin of something ripens and bears fruit.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 81-82)
My final observation on all of this is what Pope Benedict’s MC said of him a few years back in terms of the “reform of the reform” of the liturgy–that the Holy Father’s style (I suspect meaning Joseph Ratzinger) is to propose not mandate. Certainly everything that he has proposed has created discussion here and elsewhere and for the past seven years or so of his papacy. Is this where “organic development” occurs first and isn’t it interesting that it isn’t done just in the realm of “bishops and their theologian advisers” but now with rank and file Catholics and their priests and parishes. Is this an example of post-Vatican II ecclesiology that will eventually lead to the third Roman Missal which might be more in harmony with both missals (1970 and 1962) that preceded it. Just wondering. There is a genius in the Holy Father’s decision to make the 1962 missal a part of this conversation. This conversation here which includes the 1962 missal could never have taken place even six years ago.
Paul Inwood
The fact is that the Council Fathers must have considered the 1962 Missal to be deficient, otherwise they would have deliberately excluded it from the widesweeping liturgical reforms that they mandated.
The Council therefore sees particularly cogent reasons for undertaking the reform and promotion of the liturgy. (SC 1)
Wherefore the sacred Council judges that the following principles concerning the promotion and reform of the liturgy should be called to mind, and that practical norms should be established. (SC 3)
GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR THE RESTORATION AND PROMOTION OF THE SACRED LITURGY (SC, Chapter I heading)
In the restoration and promotion of the sacred liturgy, this full and active participation by all the people is the aim to be considered before all else; (SC 14)
III. The Reform of the Sacred Liturgy
21. In order that the Christian people may more certainly derive an abundance of graces from the sacred liturgy, holy Mother Church desires to undertake with great care a general restoration of the liturgy itself. For the liturgy is made up of immutable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change. These not only may but ought to be changed with the passage of time if they have suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy or have become unsuited to it.
In this restoration, both texts and rites should be drawn up so that they express more clearly the holy things which they signify; the Christian people, so far as possible, should be enabled to understand them with ease and to take part in them fully, actively, and as befits a community.
(SC 21)
The liturgical books are to be revised as soon as possible; (SC 25)
The revision of the liturgical books (SC 31)
Wherefore, in the revision of the liturgy, the following general norms should be observed: (SC 33)
Provision shall also be made, when revising the liturgical books, for legitimate variations and adaptations to different groups, regions, and peoples, especially in mission lands, provided that the substantial unity of the Roman rite is preserved; (SC 38)
In some places and circumstances, however, an even more radical adaptation of the liturgy is needed,….. Adaptations which are judged to be useful or necessary…. To ensure that adaptations may be made with all the circumspection which they demand (SC 40)
The rite of the Mass is to be revised in such a way that the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts, as also the connection between them, may be more clearly manifested, and that devout and active participation by the faithful may be more easily achieved.
For this purpose the rites are to be simplified, due care being taken to preserve their substance; elements which, with the passage of time, came to be duplicated, or were added with but little advantage, are now to be discarded; other elements which have suffered injury through accidents of history are now to be restored to the vigor which they had in the days of the holy Fathers, as may seem useful or necessary. (SC 50)
Especially on Sundays and feasts of obligation there is to be restored, after the Gospel and the homily, “the common prayer” or “the prayer of the faithful.” (SC 53)
And so on and on. Why bother to say all of this if you think everything in the garden is rosy? This was a call for reform, revision and restoration of the existing rites. Therefore what currently existed was considered inadequate. To reinstate in 2007 something that had previously been considered inadequate and deficient was nothing less than bizarre, and it is hard to believe that Josef Ratzinger did not remember what the Council Fathers had mandated. If he did remember, he chose to ignore it. History will judge how intelligent that decision was.
Joshua Vas
Evidently, they didn’t think that the garden was rosy,but I think it is debatable, at least for the Mass, whether they expected it to be as sweeping as it eventually was. For example, most of the revisions mentioned in the “Declaratio” attached to explain no. 50 were fulfilled with Inter Oecumenici, and the revised 1965 Ritus Servandus and the 1965 Ordo Missae. The two things that were not were the revision of the Offertory prayers and the realignment of the pre-Communion prayers.
Shane Maher
And we have the opinions of others (Msgr. Wardsworth included) who suggest that many contemporary celebrations of the EF actually implement more of SC’s directives than too many OF celebrations do. True, there are no bidding prayers in the EF nor does it have a three-year cycle of readings but it does preserve Latin (SC54) and avoids notable differences between the rites used in adjacent regions (SC23). Considering the fact that the council was speaking to the whole world we may consider that the sung or dialogue EF Mass popular with many liturgists in the 1960s was the ideal that much of SC was pushing the rest of the Latin Rite toward. Reading SC in that light may bring the reader to a different realization than one who imagines that the council fathers sought a wholesale rewrite of the existing liturgy. On that point, all we have to remember is the number of highly conservative prelates who voted for SC. Their number included Archbishop Lefebvre.
Shane, I think you’re being a bit optimistic about the possibility of a Prayer of the Faithful and the future of the dialogue Mass in today’s EF culture. Personally, I would welcome a restoration of a litany along the lines of the opening litany of St. John Chrysostom after the Domine vobiscum and oremus before the offertory. Still, knowing EF culture today, that’s a distant possibility. Heck, I was at EF solemn Mass last Sunday, and got stared down by another parishioner for making the sung responses with the choir. Okay, I’m not a brilliant singer. Still, the responses are supposed to be sung by the people and choir. I’ve also found that I get stares for making the altar servers’ responses at low Mass in an low but audible voice. So much for SC‘s call for active participation. Perhaps a conscious lack of verbal participation at EF Masses is oppositional defiance, as if knowing and voicing the Latin responses is “novus ordo”?
I agree with Joshua Vas that the 1964/5 Missal did fulfill most of SC‘s requirements (though it’s important to know that the Benzinger transitional missal for the United States still had some proper prayers in Latin as well as a silent Canon Missae). I don’t see why the 1965 interim missal ad orientem should be a problem for traditionalists, but many in the EF community fear than any vernacularization is a slippery slope to an all-vernacular, versus populum liturgy. Do I agree? No, I find this position a bit hysterical and reactionary. This is the way it appears from the ground; change any time soon is unlikely in my opinion.
Paul, having a new generation of Catholics familiar with the 1962 missal allows that new generation of Catholics to judge the 1962 missal in light of what you quote from Vatican II through their own lens rather than just the lens of those who wrote this document. It also allows allow us to critique the 1970 missal in a similar fashion, especially its implementation. Both missals are not immune from revision and thus a more organic revised missal might just develop from the critique of both which maintains the best of both while eliminating the chaff–who knows?
Notice – they completely “miss” your point, Paul. For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.
Why? because their study, research, experience, and expertise (including feedback and needs from their own people) asked for restoration, reform, revisions.
Would suggest that “tinkering” with the liturgy and our ritual requires more than just “arbitrary” changes. (e.g. read Fr. Allan’s blog if you want to be alarmed)
Funny – some here consistently complain about some memories from their distant past e.g. clown masses, made up eucharistic prayers, etc. Now, based upon what? they want to take the 1962 missal/TLM and decide how best to blend everything together. This would be like asking first year graduate students in history to take an early US Narrative History book (filled with myths, inaccuracies, apacrophya stories, political biases, no access to primary sources, etc. – rather just a summary based upon what that writer thought he/she knew at that time) and begin to write current history.
Talk about a rejection of “organic” development – it feels more like SP has given some license to repeat from their “side” the mistakes they are so critical of in the 1970-80s (which were, by the way, few and far between).
“Notice – they completely “miss” your point, Paul. For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.
Why? because their study, research, experience, and expertise (including feedback and needs from their own people) asked for restoration, reform, revisions.)”–Bill Dehass
No Vatican II did not abrogate the 1962 missal!
The group that advised Pope Paul VI about the revision of the Mass didn’t abrogate the 1962 missal either.
It is debatable if Pope Paul VI did so.
But it is clear that Pope Benedict XVI eliminated any doubt whatsoever not only in theory but in practice with SP, regardless of the controversy and angst it has created in a particular segment of the Church.
Bill if you weren’t alarmed over my blog, I would say you’ve had a pretty powerful conversion experience, but sadly no sign of that yet! 😉
Bill deHaas
Still making it up as you go along – just like your blog. Thought you said above on June 5th – 8:40AM – “My final observation on all of this…..”
You state: “No Vatican II did not abrogate the 1962 missal! The group that advised Pope Paul VI about the revision of the Mass didn’t abrogate the 1962 missal either. It is debatable if Pope Paul VI did so.”
Can you prove that? Have you ever read Bugnini’s autobiography, notes from many of the Consilium participants; Paul VI’s presentation when he presented/approved the new missal – he clearly abrogated the EF and the ’62 missal.
Your opinion and the solitary pronouncements of B16 also don’t make it correct. Noted that you make this statement and quickly move on and say it is a moot point given B16’s SP – which confirms my later points about what folks with your symapathies are doing. You use a late and questionnable papal intervention to justify your rewriting of history.
The vast majority of bishops and conferences would not agree with your statement.
A comparison – Council of Trent also reformed the mass and the missal. (let’s not get hung up on the “200 year rite exemptions e.g. Sarum) Some say it was a mild revision but, in reality, historians note that it truly was a positive and needed reform (not reaction) in the context of a response to the Reformation. Thus, requirements, rigor, read the black/do the red. Just like now – Trent was followed by two popes who delayed and retrenched the liturgical reforms of the council. We are mainly talking about Europe (the catholic world at that time) and liturgical reform esp. in France (French hierarchy resisted using pre-Trentan missals, regional rubrics (rites?), etc.) did not happen for over 50 years with a new generation of bishops and reformers such a Berulle, Vincent dePaul, etc. who gathered priests into communities to do missions; catechize using the Trentan reformed liturgies. (interesting that the majority of SSPX is concentrated in France and French episcopal conferences were deadset against SP.)
Go backwards, doomed to repeat history rather than learn from it – Paul says it well at today at 9:31 AM.
Bill deHaas
You might want to check JP’s copy from B16’s Milestones book on June 4th – 7:16 PM:
“….the publication of the Missal of Paul VI, which was accompanied by the almost total prohibition, after a transitional phase of only half a year, of using the missal we had had until then. I welcomed the fact that now we had a binding liturgical text after a period of experimentation that had often deformed the liturgy. But I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy.”
Now, there appears to be a difference of opinion and even experts disagree with his final line …..”nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy…” and he goes on to rewrite what happened in 1570. Would suggest that his is a minority opinion on the “entire history”.
Here are the two pronouncements by Paul VI:
Address of Pope Paul VI to a General Audience, November 19, 1969
Before the introduction of the new Mass in 1969 Pope Paul VI gave two addresses in which he made some startling admissions about the new liturgy – this is the first of those addresses.
“……The reform which is about to be brought into being is therefore a response to an authoritative mandate from the Church. It is an act of obedience. It is an act of coherence of the Church with herself. It is a step forward for her authentic tradition. It is a demonstration of fidelity and vitality, to which we all must give prompt assent.
It is not an arbitrary act. It is not a transitory or optional experiment. It is not some dilettante’s improvisation. It is a law. It has been thought out by authoritative experts of sacred Liturgy; it has been discussed and meditated upon for a long time. We shall do well to accept it with joyful interest and put it into practice punctually, unanimously and carefully.
This reform puts an end to uncertainties, to discussions, to arbitrary abuses. It calls us back to that uniformity of rites and feeling proper to the Catholic Church, the heir and continuation of that first Christian community, which was all “one single heart and a single soul” (Acts 4:32).
They might come to believe that the equation between the law of prayer, lex orandi and the law of faith, lex credendi, is compromised as a result. It is not so. Absolutely not. Above all, because the rite and the relative rubric are not in themselves a dogmatic definition. So do not let us talk about “the new Mass.” Let us rather speak of the “new epoch” in the Church’s life.
Second announcement: Paul VI, Address to a general audience, on the new ORDO MISSAE, 26 November1969:Notitiae 5 (1969) 412-416 (Italian) English translation, Documents on the Liturgy, 1963-1979 [ICEL] (The Liturgical Press, 1983)
“Clearly the most noticeable new departure is that of language. From now on the vernacular, not Latin, will be the principal language of the Mass. For those who appreciate the beauty of Latin, its power, and aptness to express the sacred, substitution of the vernacular certainly represents a great sacrifice. We are losing the idiom of the Christian ages; we become like profane intruders into the literary sanctuary of sacred language; we shall lose a large portion of that wonderful and incomparable, artistic and spiritual reality, Gregorian chant. We indeed have reason for sadness and perhaps even for bewilderment. What shall we put in the place of this angelic language? We are sacrificing a priceless treasure. For what reason? What is worth more than these sublime values of the Church? The answer may seem trite and prosaic, but it is sound because it is both human and apostolic. Our understanding of prayer is worth more than the previous, ancient garments in which it has been regally clad. Of more value, too, is the participation of the people, of modern people who are surrounded by clear, intelligible language …. If our sacred Latin should, like a thick curtain, close us off from the world of children and young people, of work and the business of everyday, then would we, fishers of men, be wise to allow it exclusive dominion over the speech of religion and prayer?”
So, confused by the “total certitude” that you have when you make statements? Or do we play a game in terms of which pope we pay attention to and when?
Bill you wrote: “For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.”
That is simply false as Pope Paul VI issued on his own authority the 1970 missal but allowed the 1962 missal to be celebrated as an extraordinary need.
You make it sound like all the bishops of Vatican II at the time of Vatican II abrogated the 1962 missal. Just admit you made a historical mistake and didn’t mean to write what you wrote. That’s all it will take and I’ll be happy. 🙂
“The reform […] is a demonstration of fidelity and vitality, to which we all must give prompt assent.”
Said back in the days when you could say that. 😉
“This reform puts an end to uncertainties, to discussions, to arbitrary abuses.”
The Pope said it, so it must be true. 😉
“It calls us back to that uniformity of rites and feeling proper to the Catholic Church.”
Uniformity of rites? Not unity, but uniformity?
Just making some hump-day jabs at Paul VI. No harm intended.
Bill deHaas
Oh, so you have admitted that Paul did abrogate the missal – “Pope Paul VI issued on his own authority the 1970 missal but allowed the 1962 missal to be celebrated as an extraordinary need.”
But this contradicts your initial statement. Unless you think his “extraordinary need” means it wasn’t abrogated in which case you need to go back to canon law school. Or check June 5- 5:25 AM from Pierre Journel.
Yep, base my comment upon the fact that 1400+ bishops voted to reform the missal and clearly agreed that this would be done under Paul’s direction who then implemented Consilium. Your comment – “…..on his own authority the 1970” – guess you are implying that he did this alone and that it had no connection to the bishops at Vatican II? (really? you haven’t read much in terms of primary sources, documents, Consilium, private notes, journals, Alberigo history (5 volumes)?
You say – “bill, you make it sound as if 1400 bishops abrogated the missal” – yep, that is exactly what I am saying – there is more than enough linkage from the votes and approved directives in Vatican II to make that statement and linkage vs. your statement that somehow Paul VI acted in “isolation” (oh, that’s right – there is not spirit of VII”?) I also support my conviction by Paul Inwood’s latest comments about the actual history and development post 1965 – bishops were making requests, demands for even more changes – June 6 – 5:25AM:
“…advise those who think that the reforms as actually carried out were not those that the Council Fathers had in mind should read Piero Marini’s A Challenging Reform which documents in detail how the reforms that were actually implemented were precisely those that the bishops of the world (i.e. those same Council Fathers) very clearly asked for, once they had seen the pastoral potential of the reform. Indeed, the Consilium was hard pressed to keep up with the demands it was receiving from hierarchies across the globe.”
You end with: “Just admit you made a historical mistake and didn’t mean to write what you wrote. That’s all it will take and I’ll be happy.”
Who made the “historical” mistake? Since you appear to have little use for historical criticism or going any earlier than 1950, not sure I see your “certitude” or any understanding of history?
But of course the only four bishops thus far who have any real authority over promulgating the form of the Mass have also allowed for the 1962 missal to be celebrated in an extraordinary way, Paul VI, John Paul I (briefly of course) John Paul II who expanded what extraordinary meant, and Benedict XVI who expanded extraordinary in an extraordinary way.
Theologians can muse all they want and so can you and I but when push comes to shove the bishops of Rome call the shots which is extraordinary when they act alone infallibly which is not the case with the liturgical decisions they have thus far made which are a part of the Ordinary Magisterium of the Church even when they allowed the so-called abrogated 1962 missal to be celebrated under the term extraordinary.
Bill deHaas
JP – it really does get amusing.
Appears that you have two simplistic approaches here:
– no abrogation vs. abrogation (each side makes its own historical assertions and justifications quoting from applicable popes, experts, etc. but leaving or skipping over those who may not support their side – and this includes popes)
– too much restoration from before the Tridentine Rite vs. restoration that used the total experience of the church from 1st century on – truly organic. (each side makes up its own order of mass with claims and counterclaims about who skipped over what period of time; didn’t pay enough attention to which period’s accretions, etc.)
Agree – added Paul VI’s announcements given the original topic of this post. It gets to my initial comment about the phrasing of the questions – too dependent upon papal perogatives or as you stated – “The Pope said it, so it must be true” (or, per Allan, what you think the pope said)
To some of your highlighted sentences – keep in mind the audience Paul VI was speaking to on those two days; keep in mind the context, audience, time period, and tensions at that time. It puts a different spin on what you have humurously highlighted.
Bill deHaas
Will take that as your admission, Alllan, thanks.
The bishop of Rome never acts “alone’ infallibly
And only bishop of Rome has any real authority over promulgating the form of the Mass – where do you think that authority comes from? Does that mean a council doesn’t have “any real authority”? You might want to pull out your 1950’s catechism on these points.
Your hierarachical, militaristic model is showing itself.
Shane Maher
But then there is this rub: “The Council also desires that, where necessary (not everywhere it seems), the rites be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition …” (SC 4).
Paul Inwood
While we’re being sticklers for accuracy, Lefebvre did not vote for SC. He was one of the tiny handful who didn’t.
I think that knowing that ++Lefebvre signed SC is problematic for progressives and arch-traditionalists alike. Progressive sometimes seem to take an approach suggesting that there is little reason for a conservative to find his views or piety sustained by the V2 documents. Arch-traditionalists similarly seem to prefer imagining that the traditional faith cannot be preserved by V2. Lefebvre may be proving both progressives and arch-traditionalists to be wrong with his signature.
The fact is that the Council Fathers must have considered the 1962 Missal to be deficient, otherwise they would have deliberately excluded it from the widesweeping liturgical reforms that they mandated.
OK… but that doesn’t mean that any particular reform they set out was neccesarily a good idea. Nor even that they (or those who tried to implement their ideas) didn’t neccesarily err in their judgment about particular parts of the liturgy.
Paul Inwood
Of course. But the sensible thing would then be to adapt and modify, moving forwards and learning from mistakes made. The indefensible thing is moving backwards to something which was, I am sure the Council Fathers would agree, worse than what came later.
People forget that the Liturgical Movement started in 19th-century France, was boosted by Beauduin in 1909, and thereafter progressed right up to Vatican II, thus ensuring that both the reforms that were mandated and their concrete implementation were the result of over half a century of solid scholarship. There was no hermeneutic of rupture — quite the reverse. Anyone who doubts this should read Keith Pecklers’ The Genius of the Roman Rite.
Further, I advise those who think that the reforms as actually carried out were not those that the Council Fathers had in mind should read Piero Marini’s A Challenging Reform which documents in detail how the reforms that were actually implemented were precisely those that the bishops of the world (i.e. those same Council Fathers) very clearly asked for, once they had seen the pastoral potential of the reform. Indeed, the Consilium was hard pressed to keep up with the demands it was receiving from hierarchies across the globe.
Yes, mistakes were inevitably made, but excessive speed in responding to the bishops’ demands may well have been a contributory factor, as well as excessive enthusiasm by practitioners who realized that the only way to find out how to do things well was to try them out and then tweak continually. What now seems incomprehensible is the desire to return to something which the Council Fathers had clearly defined as inadequate and deficient.
You’re welcome; I’ll be putting up quotes from The Spirit of the Liturgy later today.
Is there a resource online that shows what the order of the “normative Mass” presented at the 1967 Synod was? I have read elsewhere that the “normative Mass” and the Missal of 1969 are substantially the same, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a detailed account of the 1967 text… if I have, it was probably in Bugnini’s The Reform of the Liturgy, but that was a library loan and I don’t have it at hand.
JP – there is not, to my knowlege. I’m not sure how exactly email exchange would work since this is a public board – but I have some scans I could send you.
In general, the 1967 schema is practically the same as the 1969 Ordo Missae. The main differences are in rubrics – several things were still somewhat up in the air, such as the position of a penitential rite, etc. To give an example, a proposal is either Kyrie OR Gloria, but not both. But in general, all the texts of the 1969 are more or less there, in the same order. There are a few oddities: the Indulgentiam and Quid retribuam are retained, the Blessing is still placed after the Dismissal. The main textual-ritual difference is at the Preparation of the Gifts, where the prayers and rites are very different (the prayers are a Didache and Proverbs inspired version). The Eucharistic Prayers also show certain variations from their final forms although they are largely the same. The 5th…
Comments
117 responses to “This Week’s Discussion Question: The Target of Pope Benedict’s Criticism”
Certainly Pope Benedict has certain opinions on the liturgy voiced and written as a Cardinal and things he has actually done once he became pope. There are only two authoritative things that he has done, SP allowing for the older liturgy to be celebrated more liberally as an “Extraordinary Form” of the Church and his mandate that the Latin words of the consecration of the Precious Blood be translated in the vernacular as “for many” rather than “for all.” Tied into this of course is the re-translations of the vernaculars which he inherited and has confirmed. Apart from these, he hasn’t mandated anything but models options that are not common but not disallowed in the GIRM or rubrics, such as his insistence on the older form of decorating the altar when he celebrates Mass and/or facing ad orientem. He also insists that those receiving Holy Communion from him kneel and receive Holy Communion on the Tongue. He seems to also insist on Latin for the Preface dialogue, Preface and Eucharistic prayer and Pater Noster for his Masses even when he uses the vernacular for other parts.
He has indicated, I believe before he came to be pope, that the commission that formulated the revision of the Mass fabricated it rather than promoting an “organic development.” I’m not sure he has said this after he became pope though. He certainly celebrates the Ordinary Form of the Mass exclusively, by the book and its rubrics. He hasn’t celebrated the Extraordinary Form. Lay participation in the ministry of lector is maintained and also for the Universal Prayer and offertory procession. He allows for commentary and greetings before the Penitential Rite and After the Prayer after Holy Communion, an especially long and raucous form of it after the Prayer after Communion at the Mass in Milan with over 1 million people. That Mass was a combination of vernacular and Latin, official chants and more modern idioms of music. I think what is implied in much of what he does is that there is a hierarchy of authority in Vatican II and post Vatican II decrees and developments with the Liturgy. In other words he has created a very fluid situation for the Church and her bishops to move along an “organic development” of the “reform of the reform” in continuity and has even encouraged priests and local congregations to implement some of what he has modeled by the very fact that he does what he does as a form of modeling what he hopes for the rest of the Church as it regards the liturgy. He doesn’t require rigid uniformity and actively encourages a variety of “rites” in the Latin Rite, including the older forms and the new Anglican Rite. That’s very progressive.
What is usually brought up in these cases (and what Fr. Allan seems to allude to above) is this passage from Ratzinger’s preface to the French edition of Gamber’s book on the reform of the liturgy:
This is typically presented as a critique of the reformed liturgy. I myself see no evidence of this in the text itself. I suspect that it refers to some of the more creative experimentation that took place after the Council, not to the official reform. I myself experienced some of this creative experimentation while living in Europe — Eucharistic prayers written by liturgy committees, scripture reading replaced by UNESCO reports, etc.) and found it pretty banal.
Does the Pope think the reformed liturgy could have been better and that in some places it went too far? Probably. Does he dismiss it as “a fabrication, a banal on- the-spot product”? I don’t think so. After all, he celebrates it every day.
A pious woman asked me today if she is the only person who feels distraught at the new translation of the Mass. The faithful are suffering from the horrible language, and the way Benedict’s Vatican have thrust its jackboot in their faces. Christ’s little ones deserve better. It is the birthright of all Christians to be allowed to pray in meaningful language. Fatuous balloons of vanity have imposed their bizarre linguistic predilections on people of truer and deeper faith than theirs. The English speaking bishops have slept on the job, and made themselves guilty of criminal pastoral negligence.
I’ve seen this response to the new missal as well, not an organized opposition so much as an ongoing series of spontaneous comments to the effect of “WHAT did he just say?”
What are the main targets of his criticism? [At whom] is his criticism directed?
Fr. Joe, how does your comment address the questions Fr. Ruff has posed? It sounds more like criticism of Pope Benedict and the English-speaking bishops, rather than commentary on Pope Benedict’s criticisms of the liturgy.
Thanks, Jeffrey. I also wondered how JO’L’s comments fit the question at hand. Which is, everyone, your analysis of Pope Benedict’s criticism and at whom he directs it.
awr
JO’L –
Am I the only one who doesn’t feel distraught at the new translation of the mass?
Too, I know quite a lot of faithful who are NOT suffering from the horrible language.
If I WERE distraught, and all these people WERE suffering, I suppose that you would then feel that we were deserving of ‘pastoral consideration’.
Actually, I can groan as well as you at some of the bloopers we have been dealt; but, for me, this is just endemically Roman Catholic: it was awful in ’73, it was no better in ’98, and it’s a disappointment now, although what we have now is better than what we had.
If they ever got it right, then people would grumble that it sounded Anglican.
The new translation is absolutely a non issue in my parish and all the laity’s parts have been well assimilated. That doesn’t close the doors to future organic refinements though. Buy no hysteria here or wringing of hands.
Fr. Allan, from your posts on this site it is clear to me that, were I one of your parishioners, I would never bring or have brought my concerns about this translation and its implications for the Church to you. In all of your posts that I have read, I’ve detected only the barest shred of empathy for those of us who view this change with profound sadness or even anger.
So, in statistical terms, I would say that your sample suffers from a selection bias; if your parishioners fear reprisal or even just curt dismissal they will not engage you on this topic.
Go to his blog – you will really be disheartened. The epitome of what Yves Congar in the just posted blog with his newly translated Journal calls “integralist”. Click on the Journal link and go to the third introduction by Paul Philibert, OP.
Most of us who are adults, Richard, know that reading someone is very one dimensional, living with, hearing and knowing someone is multidimensional. Your perception of me is the problem of the virtual world and I fear that our young who are more engaged in this kind of technology will only have one-dimensional knowledge of people because of the technology they use so well.
As Fritz has already indicated, the main target of Benedict’s criticism seems to be the perception that in the reforms/their implementation, “We abandoned the organic, living process of growth and development over the centuries, and replaced it–as in a manufacturing process–with a fabrication, a banal on- the-spot product.” But as Fr. Allan has also indicated, this has resulted in rather few legislative measures.
Broadly speaking, I think what Benedict is aiming at is a (perceived) ‘liturgical ethos’ out of line with the (perceived) liturgical ethos of the Church’s history. While this idea of liturgical ethos is incredibly vague, it may be a better tool than judging liturgical changes according to ‘organic development’ or ‘fabrication’. These two categories are less than helpful when dealing with any liturgical history because when changes occur, we can presume that someone willfully made the change. Is it only organic if we don’t know who did this or why? Why are the liturgical reforms prior to Vatican II ‘organic’ while those of the council or perhaps after are ‘fabricated’?
Using ‘ethos’ may allow for one to completely accept the reforms of the council (as Benedict does, at least in action), but still criticize some ‘experimentation’ (but of course, some experimentation might very well be of the proper ethos). This ethos may also allow for a real critique of the state of liturgy prior to the council too (i.e. a rushed, inaudible low-mass). Again, this is a vague concept that I don’t claim to have down, but it may prove fruitful in discussion.
Joe – Perhaps ‘ethos’ might also help clarify what understanding of ‘meaningful’ is most applicable to the style of language used in liturgy? I fully agree that the current translation is deeply flawed, but I’m not ‘meaningful’ is the best standard to use, because of course, many do find the current translation ‘meaningful’ for some of the reasons I suspect you and I dislike.
The problem is that Trent effectively killed that ethos by preserving the liturgy in amber. (That, btw, was a modern, rationalistic impulse at work in the Tridentine era.) Experimentation is, descriptively, part and parcel of recovering that ethos (it doesn’t mean all experimentation is [insert approving adjective of choice here]).
What ethos did Trent kill?
I’m not necessarily disagreeing with your assessment of what Trent was doing in its reforms (i.e. ‘preserving it in amber,’ – though I’m guessing they thought of it more as eliminating ‘false’ historical accretions), but I’m not so sure I would agree that Trent killed the ethos of the liturgy. In fact, what little I have in mind, isn’t something that a council could actually ‘kill’. I’m probably misreading you, but that kind of declaration sounds analogous to the kind of comments those who reject the reforms of Vatican II make – “It (the Council) broke the unbroken tradition of the Roman Catholic Church and the only option is to reject the council’s teachings.”
So your statement that Trent killed the ethos would require, at least for me, some clarification on what it is that Trent eliminated that is part of (or the entirety of) the proper ethos – at least to you. Couldn’t a counterargument could be claimed that the reforms of Trent, like those of Vatican II, attempted to revive the proper ethos of the liturgy after “the wickedness of time or the corruption and carelessness of people” obscured it, yes? According to you, why would that be a faulty argument? Is it the act of conciliar reform that is itself that kills the ethos? Or is it something more specific?
Some hastily written sentences, there. Sorry for the errors.
I am talking about a liturgical ethos where organic development can occur. When you freeze the liturgy pretty much in place, you kill such an ethos. The effect was partly intentional, partly unintended. Once you’ve frozen and centralized decisionmaking about liturgical change, and decreed that change that does not come from above is not licit, then organic development cannot occur in any meaningful sense of that term. In this way, Trent purchased this problem.
Ah. I understand better what you mean now.
I too think the increased centralization of decision making power is a lamentable characteristic of modern and contemporary Catholic liturgical sensibilities. I would only say that ‘organic development’ might not be a component of liturgical ethos, or at least not a central component – if only because, as I mentioned in my post above, development in liturgy is only very distantly analogous to the development of a living body. When changes occur in the liturgy, even on a very small scale, someone with some kind of authority chose to effect a change. Why such small scale versions of this qualify as ‘organic’ while large scale conciliar reforms do not seems nonsensical to me.
I’ve heard comments like this from my Orthodox colleagues before, but what seems unclear is how any centralized reform can be admitted as acceptable. And if they can never be acceptable, what then is the living member of Church to do? Become Old Believers or attempt to reconstruct a pre-Tridentine/Carolingian/Nicene liturgy? Are we to skip over x centuries of Church history in order to find a pure, organically developed expression of Christian faith?
At certain points in its history, and from quite early on, the Church has deemed centralized legislation of the celebration of the liturgy necessary. Apparently ‘organic development’ doesn’t always cut it (at least in the Church’s historical eyes) and that’s why I think its a flimsy concept for these kinds of discussions.
I don’t think SP had much to do with liturgy. It was primarily concerned with reconciling with the SSPX. There may have been an element of restoring the reputation of the traditional rite which was being held captive by the SSPX.
Translation issues are another matter. I do not undertand them, and I find it hard to believe he supported, or did not oppose, the guidelines in LA. I doubt that he wants to overrule the decisions made before he became Pope. (he undoubtedly was one of those involved in making those decisions then, but that does not mean he agreed with the entirety of them.)
The decision to accept dissatisfied Anglicans is probably a liturgical decision, ie a reaffirmation of the invalidity of Anglican Orders. This makes a statement about the nature of liturgy that has profound implications that are largely being ignored, but its original impetus is probably dogmatic.
Jim – agree somewhat with what you say. Predicate that upon the debate going on around B16’s Advent “hermeneutic” talk. Would suggest that the context and background of his comments have to do with the ongoing and personal desire on his part to make peace with the SSPX.
When I have stated that some seem to run with his brief talk and draw up some type of “new liturgical universe” – it merely feels like they are taking one talk and running wild – so, organic, rupture, continuity seems to undergird their need to justify two forms of one rite; take the word “continuity” and use it to justify any pre-VII liturgy e.g. ad orientem, latin, TLM, you name it. Now, we are going to see “mutual enhancement”. If the SSPX was the driving force behind his comments, then it would suggest that the reform of the reform has not understood his “indult” or his liturgical directions.
Yet, if you ever watch papal masses, B16 himself never does the EF – why not? why aren’t we paying attention to that if we feel that all decision revolve around the pope?
When I rea the article by Dulles that Shane suggested, I realized that BXVI was not starting from scratch in his statement on continuity and rupture. It goes back to the 1985 Synod: It is not licit to separate the pastoral character from the doctrinal vigor of the documents. In the same way, it is not legitimate to separate the spirit and the letter of the Council. Moreover, the Council must be understood in continuity with the great tradition of the Church, and at the same time we must receive light from the Council’s own doctrine for today’s Church and the men of our time. The Church is one and the same throughout all the councils.
While criticizing some excesses on the patoral side, he was correcting the attitude you are criticizing. Some rupture is a part of reform. The current liturgy is in continuity with our past, and cannot be repudiated. Any hermeneutic that sees only rupture at VII, like that of SSPX, has made a grave mistake.
So my impression is that many are taking one talk and running wild with it so people do not use it against them. The pope belieeves heartily in the refroms from the Council, and even more heartily in the need for the pope to be respected. My approach would be to use that one speech to argue that our current liturgy is continuity and refversion to the recent past is a rupture. That means finding the continuity that is more important than ritualism and nostalgia.
Agree wholeheartedly with this, Jim. Also, it is echoed by the work of Fr. Komonchak. But, don’t bet that folks such as Fr. Allan will buy into your approach or explanation.
JMcK –
Do you really intend, by your use of the adjective ‘dissatisfied’, to view Anglicans who have reconciled with the Catholic Church and are now Anglican Use Catholics in a purely negative and rather unfavourable light? We are quite positive about our situation, and far from being dissatisfied, have viewed our journey as nothing but a positive movement from beginning to end. It is fulfillment for a people who always yearned for a rapprochement between Canterbury and Rome, and realised that such was not going to happen because of developments in the Anglican Communion which, rather than making rapprochement possible, aggravated any thought of it.
Too, your assessment of Anglicanorum coetibus as merely a reaffirmation of the invalidity of Anglican orders is, while it may be said to accomplish that implicitly, I think, an over-simplification. Most of us had thought that this was a pastoral act, and the fruit of genuine oecumenism which would have been unthinkable but for Vatican II. My own personal views about Anglican orders are that some of them are most likely
unquestionably valid and some aren’t, this owing to the variety of lineages (and intent) within Anglicanism. Too, I think that, for complex political as well as doctrinal and theological reasons, it is almost a necessity for Rome to pour cold water on even the best of Anglicanism that it wouldn’t think of pouring on the Orthodox. At any rate, the direction in which Anglicanism is headed makes this debate moot at best. (My thinking here is actually in flux, and your comments [or those of others] would be welcome.)
I struggled with the word “dissatisfied” but decided to leave it. What would you use?
Of the issues I mentioned, AC is the only one that I think is really liturgical in motivation. It allows people who had no true liturgy to have one, in their own language. (at least that is how I think BXVI sees it) The rest of us have an English translation of the Roman Rite; the ex-Anglicans are allowed their own native English ritual. He institutionalizes the papal ties of the new groups by tying them to the Pope as a replacement for the “uniform text.”
There is an old papal saying “What a pope can do, a pope can undo.” Most people do not understand this. In terms of the current discussion, the papacy can fabricate what it likes while Anglicans and Orthodox have to endure an organic process. Fabrication is a neccesary component of papal authority however much it is restrained by tradition and faith. Change can come mor quickly among Roman Catholics because of papal power, and becoming a Roman Catholic entails accepting that capacity for “quick” change in place of the back and forth in less centralized communities.
When I say “Anglican Orders” I am not talking about lineages and history, but about the validity of the Eucharist. It is the chief ecumenical problem and AC does nothing to solve it. It makes it worse in many ways, rolling back ecumenism to the 50s when the pope learned theology. I hope that you and other Anglicans who join our church are able to overcome the obstacles it proposes. Judging by your comments about the state of the Anglican churches today, I see us only going back to the divides of our past instead of learning from one another.
“It was primarily concerned with reconciling with the SSPX.”
There’s plenty of evidence that the SSPX was a secondary consideration in his motives for issuing the motu proprio.
Most of the young priests and seminarians that I know – at least in the U.S. – have a serious interest in the traditional mass. I don’t think that the Pope is unaware of that. Or that he didn’t anticipate the development – one which might, in the long run, allow both missals to be, as he put it, “mutually enriching.”
What do you consider to be evidence that SSPX is not the principal target of SP? This is a sincere question. I really am open to changing my mind on this.
re: Richard Malcolm on June 4, 2012 – 4:24 pm
I am of two minds about this. While there is a small but enthusiastic group of laity and clergy in communion with the Roman rite who are attached to the extraordinary form, the number of SSPX members is just as large, if not larger in number.
I am convinced that SP was intended for both groups, but with the accent falling on enticements to bring the SSPX back into the fold. Pope Benedict’s half-measures about the Good Friday bidding prayers, for example, appear to be pitched towards the SSPX who do not accept Nostra Aetate. My only disappointment with SP is its implicit downplay of conciliar documents and teachings. If the SSPX wishes to return, it has to accept the plain-meaning of the conciliar teachings. No pope should minimize conciliar teachings to attract those who have intentionally distanced themselves from post-conciliar Catholicism.
I will go further than Jordan and say that the reconciliation of the SSPX would be a deeply destructive move. I pray that Pope Benedict turns away from this harmful course.
It would bring in a militant group that believes, among other things, that the normative form of the Mass, the form that the pope himself celebrates exclusively, is — at very best — valid but spiritually toxic to those who participate. A group that would welcome the return of religious compulsion. A group whose antisemitism is covered with the thinnest veil.
The SSPX itself seems to be riven by internal disputes: the line of tension seems to run between the goofy fatwahs of Richard Williamson and the smiling blandishments of Bernard Fellay. At very least they should be given time to resolve these squabbles internally, before bringing them with them into the Church.
Of necessity the reform and renewal of the liturgy after VII had to be “fabricated,” since organic development of the Roman rite had been off limits for a millennium or so. Think of what could have happened had Augustine of Canterbury successfully pleaded for permission to celebrate the divine mysteries in the language(s) of his mission territory! Would a variation of the Roman Rite have developed there just as the Glagolithic Mass (the Roman rite in Old Church Slavonic) developed in the southern Slavic regions?
No, the charge of “fabrication” is an unfair one. The reforms after VII instead were the result of serious study of the sources of our liturgical development. The Church, ever vigilant of the rich store of her tradition, went back to her storehouse and made new some of her ancient treasures.
(Sorry, but I wrote my comment before seeing Karl Liam’s contributions, which are an even fuller expression of the notion of “organic development.”)
Of necessity the reform and renewal of the liturgy after VII had to be “fabricated,” since organic development of the Roman rite had been off limits for a millennium or so.
This is often repeated to the point of being conventional wisdom on both the left and the right, but in fact there was a great deal of development in the Roman Rite between the time of St. Pius V and 1962.
Of the rite itself, or of the setting of the rite (i.e. music, vestments, architecture, additional devotional prayers)? If one excludes the reform of Holy Week (which most true blue trads see as the camel’s nose under the tent anyway), was there much in the way of development of the rite itself? Particularly if one looks to the centuries prior to Pius X?
Great idea, Fr. Ruff – questions from the “people in the pews” – like it.
That being said – have trouble with the approach and context of the questions. And this only adds and contributes to the bi-polar responses. Allow me to explain – all three questions revolve around the “pope” – who he is, what he said, what happened. Would also suggest that one question is biased when it states – “incorrectly implemented”.
Explanation – would suggest that Vatican II tried to ressource a “biblical” understanding of church; thus, moving away from a strict hierarchical or authoritative concept. Its purposes included ecumenism (common baptism, common scripture, common early tradition). Thus, key elements of the council start with the People of God and then the “proper” understanding, ministry, and role of episcopal/papal hierarchy; a common magisterium, etc.
Thus, the question would start with – what did the council say about whatever. Starting with questions about the papal decisions diminishes, if not, skews the fact the VII ennunciated collegiality as a sign from our apostolic legacy – so, SC came from the council who left its development/direction to Paul VI (but not the other way around). Paul empowered the Consilium which was the concilar directive. Practically, SC laid out the directive that episcopal conferences were to make liturgical decisions (thus, my feeling about the slant of these questions).
From Yves Congar’s just translated book:
“Congar’s whole life work was put on the line at Vatican II in his personal combat to make the case for an nderstanding of the church that is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, expressed in the lives of all the baptised, oriented toward the mission of the kingdom of God in the world, and a vocation to freedom under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. He knew that the church had to be a living organism, as opposed to a church that was merely a museum of past spiritual treasures.”
“By going back to the early sources, Congar and others represented
a risk for the power structure that conceived the papal office as a monarchy supported by a dictatorial Roman Curia and always inclined to consider anything done in the Vatican as sharing in the infallibility of the pope.
This battle for a living church, exemplified again and again in confrontations
over texts and principles, is the underlying story. All of these elements, and much more, flowed out of the pastoral renewal of the Council and were bitterly contested at the time. Why? It is a question worth asking, especially since an important and powerful minority in the church today is inclined to reverse changes of this sort. This council journal of Yves Congar is revealing in portraying the attitudes and the mechanisms of an ecclesiastical mentality that is crucial to understand, if we are to comprehend present transitions in the life of the church. Congar generally referred to this mentality as ‘intégrisme’, a French word that cannot easily be translated directly into English, although many translators have simply transliterated it as ‘integralism’. intégristes are emotionally attached to the idea of a Christendom invested with a glorious past of kings and bishops working hand-in-hand with the pope—all of them enjoying the authority to impose their views. This is, says Congar, a fatal nostalgia.”
“To understand intégrisme, then, we have to understand it as a mentality that
identifies itself completely with what is old-fashioned and that appeals to hierarchical authority as the justification for its point of view. It is an instinct to choose what was done before over what is struggling for new expression. It has little respect for anything that comes from below, but is deeply attached to what comes down from on high. When it is a question of expressing this attitude in religious matters, there are certain characteristic positions typical of this mentality……”
(the next blog – review his journal and the third introduction – the rest can be found in Congar’s Ecclesiastical Subtext: Intransigent Conservatism Paul Philibert OP)
Agree with Deacon Fritz & Fr. Krismann but suggest this because the discussion/debate merely moves to different ground – in addition to the Jungmann insert you could add earlier blogs about B16’s Advent talk on the hermeneutic of reform. So, instead of arguing about reform or rupture whether in or against continuty, we shift to what is the meaning of “organic” or “fabrication” (which is a straw man). Just feel that focusing only on papal announcements misses the point and skews our understanding – it violates the very approach used in Vatican II.
Keep in mind that there are those of us who don’t see organic development as the highest principle of Catholic worship. It is a pastoral principle, to be sure. But SC touted a few other more important points.
I have three books by Ratzinger that touch upon the liturgy: Milestones, The Feast of Faith, and The Spirit of the Liturgy. I’ll try to pull out quotes from each, putting each quote in its own comment to facilitate organized conversation. (I hope this does not break the commenting policy.)
“It would not have occurred to any of the Fathers to see in [Sac. Conc.] a ‘revolution’ signifying the ‘end of the Middle Ages’, as some theologians felt they should interpret it subsequently. The work was seen as a continuation of the reforms introduced by Pius X and carried on carefully but resolutely by Pius XII. General expressions such as ‘the liturgical books should be revised as soon as possible’ were understood in this sense: as the uninterrupted continuation of that development which had always been there and which, since Pius X and XII, had received a definite profile from the rediscovery of the classical Roman liturgical traditions, which was, of course, to overcome certain tendencies of Baroque liturgy and 19th century devotional piety and to promote a new humble and sober centering of the authentic mystery of Christ’s presence in his Church. In this context it is not surprising that the ‘model Mass’ now proposed, which was supposed to (and in fact did) take the place of the traditional Ordo missae, was in 1967 rejected by the majority of the Fathers who had been called together to a special synod on the matter.” (Milestones, 123)
Jeff,
First, thanks. This is helpful.
Second, a puzzling thing in this passage is the parenthetical “(and in fact did).” The “model Mass” that was tried out in 1967 was in fact significantly different from what we ended up with eventually — much more “stripped down.” So I’m not sure what the Pope is saying here.
You’re welcome; I’ll be putting up quotes from The Spirit of the Liturgy later today.
Is there a resource online that shows what the order of the “normative Mass” presented at the 1967 Synod was? I have read elsewhere that the “normative Mass” and the Missal of 1969 are substantially the same, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a detailed account of the 1967 text… if I have, it was probably in Bugnini’s The Reform of the Liturgy, but that was a library loan and I don’t have it at hand.
JP – there is not, to my knowledge. I’m not sure how exactly email exchange would work since this is a public thread– but I have some scans I could send you.
In general, the 1967 schema is practically the same as the 1969 Ordo Missae. The main differences are in rubrics – several things were still somewhat up in the air, such as the position of a penitential rite, etc. To give an example, a proposal is either Kyrie OR Gloria, but not both. But in general, all the texts of the 1969 are more or less there, in the same order. There are a few oddities: the Indulgentiam and Quid retribuam are retained, the Blessing is still placed after the Dismissal. The main textual-ritual difference is at the Preparation of the Gifts, where the prayers and rites are very different (the prayers are a Didache and Proverbs inspired version). The Eucharistic Prayers also show certain variations from their final forms although they are largely the same. The 5th EP, inspired by the Egyptian Basil anaphora, is not yet nixed.
Joshua – I would be very interested in receiving those scans.
My gmail address is japhy.734.
“… the publication of the Missal of Paul VI, which was accompanied by the almost total prohibition, after a transitional phase of only half a year, of using the missal we had had until then. I welcomed the fact that now we had a binding liturgical text after a period of experimentation that had often deformed the liturgy. But I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy. The previous missal had been created by Pius V in 1570 in connection with the Council of Trent; and so it was quite normal that, after four hundred years and a new council, a new pope would present us with a new missal. But the historical truth of the matter is different.
“Pius V had simply ordered a reworking of the Missale Romanum then being used, which is the normal thing as history develops over the course of centuries. Many of his successors had likewise reworked this missal again, but without ever setting one missal against another. It was a continual process of growth and purification in which continuity was never destroyed. There is no such thing as a ‘Missal of Pius V’ created by Pius V himself. There is only the reworking done by Pius V as one phase in a long history of growth. […]
“It was reasonable and right of the [2nd Vatican] Council to order a revision of the missal such as had often taken place before and which this time had to be more thorough than before, above all because of the introduction of the vernacular.
“But more than this now happened: the old building was demolished, and another was built, to be sure largely using materials from the previous one and even using the old building plans. There is no doubt that this new missal in many respects brought with it a real improvement and enrichment; but setting it as a new construction over against what had grown historically, thereby makes the liturgy appear to be no longer a living development but the product of erudite work and juridical authority; this has caused us enormous harm.
“For then the impression had to emerge that liturgy is something ‘made’, not something given in advance but something lying within our own power of decision. From this it also follows that we are not to recognize the scholars and the central authority alone as decision makers, but that in the end each and every ‘community’ must provide itself with its own liturgy. When liturgy is self-made, however, then it can no longer give us what its proper gift should be: the encounter with the mystery that is not our own product but rather our origin and the source of our life. A renewal of liturgical awareness, a liturgical reconciliation that again recognizes the unity of the history of the liturgy and that understands Vatican II, not as a breach, but as a stage of development: these things are urgently needed for the life of the Church.
“I am convinced that the crisis in the Church that we are experiencing today [1997] is to a large extent due to the disintegration of the liturgy, which at times has even come to be conceived of etsi Deus non daretur: in that it is a matter of indifference whether or not God exists and whether or not he speaks to us and hears us. But when the community of faith, the worldwide unity of the Church and her history, and the mystery of the living Christ are no longer visible in the liturgy, where else, then, is the Church to become visible in her spiritual essence? Then the community is celebrating only itself, an activity that is utterly fruitless.
“And, because the ecclesial community cannot have its origin from itself but emerges as a unity only from the Lord, through faith, such circumstances will inexorably result in a disintegration into sectarian parties of all kinds — partisan opposition within a Church tearing herself apart. This is why we need a new Liturgical Movement, which will call to life the real heritage of the Second Vatican Council.” (Milestones, 146-149)
Then the community is celebrating only itself, an activity that is utterly fruitless.
This is one of my disappointments with many “major event” Masses I have seen or participated in. Even bishops who are generally conservative on liturgical matters seem to indulge in making some Masses into a meeting of the local chapter of the Ain’t It Great To Be Catholic club. I’m not against celebrating human accomplishments, I would just rather let the Mass be the Mass and keep the glad-handing and showboating and thank you speeches for later.
Sadly, even the pope celebrates (or gets roped into) liturgies that suffer from this problem. I imagine he would prefer less interruptions in the Masses he celebrates, less virtuoso performances, etc.
Ratzinger’s description of the nature of the Tridentine liturgical reform, and its comparison to the liturgical reform following Vatican II, is retold in similar words in The Feast of Faith pages 85-87. In particular:
“With all its advantages, the new Missal was published as if it were a book put together by professors, not a phase in a continual growth process. Such a thing has never happened before. It is absolutely contrary to the laws of liturgical growth, and it has resulted in the nonsensical notion that Trent and Pius V had ‘produced’ a Missal four hundred years ago. The Catholic liturgy was thus reduced to the level of a mere product of modern times.” (The Feast of Faith, 86)
On the one hand, I think the Pope has a valid point that liturgical change had probably never occurred as rapidly as it did after Vatican II, and the result (in combination with many other things) sent people reeling.
On the other hand, a revision of the Missal in the context of modern rapid communications and the growth of historical scholarship had also never occurred before. Should the Church not have availed itself of that scholarship? those means of communication? What would the alternative be?
On the other hand, a revision of the Missal in the context of modern rapid communications and the growth of historical scholarship had also never occurred before.
Was the situation that much different in 1970 than in 1960?
If the missal of Pius V replaced all other western, local missals (something I don’t believe had ever happened before in the Roman rite), then wasn’t this missal “produced” by the Council? Before Trent wasn’t there a missal used in Paris from about 1474 and one used in the papal court which served as the model for Pius’ missal? If so, isn’t this Tridentine text what one could call an “on the spot” liturgy?
Trent abolished a number of practices of a purely local nature. Out went the farced Kyrie and Gloria. Uniform vestment colors are imposed. Out went the enclosed sanctuaries and rood screens/the pulpitum? I think a French form of the offertory prayers was adopted.
No, Dunstan, Trent preserved Uses that were more than 200 years old at the date of the Council: Sarum lived on in recusant use, as did the Gallican rites until the end of the 18th century; not to mention the Ambrosian, Mozarabic, Carthusian, Dominican, Carmelite and Braga Uses.
, because the ecclesial community cannot have its origin from itself but emerges as a unity only from the Lord, through faith, such circumstances will inexorably result in a disintegration into sectarian parties of all kinds — partisan opposition within a Church tearing herself apart. This is why we need a new Liturgical Movement, which will call to life the real heritage of the Second Vatican Council.”
What?
To preven “disintegration into. Sectarian parties” we need a new party?
Unity is “from the Lord, through faith” so let’s get together to accomplish it? Isn’t that like a rallying cry “we can’t do anything, so let’s go do it!”??
“Liturgy has a cosmic and universal dimension. The community does not become a community by mutual interaction. It receives its being as a gift from an already existing completeness, totality, and in return it gives itself back to this totality. […] This is why liturgy cannot be ‘made’. It has to be simply received as a given reality and continually revitalized. This is why its universality is expressed in a form binding on the whole Church, committed to the local congregation in the form of the ‘rite’. As ‘feast’, liturgy goes beyond the realm of what can be made and manipulated; it introduces us to the realm of given, living reality, which communicates itself to us. This is why, at all times and in all religions, the fundamental law of liturgy has been the law of organic growth within the universality of the common tradition.
“Even in the huge transition from the Old to the New Testament, this rule was not breached, the continuity of liturgical development was not interrupted: Jesus introduced his words at the Last Supper organically into the Jewish liturgy at the point where it was open to them, as it were, waiting for them. The growing Church carefully continued this process of inwardly deepening, purifying and expanding the Old Testament inheritance. Neither the apostles nor their successors ‘made’ a Christian liturgy; it grew organically as a result of the Christian reading of the Jewish inheritance, fashioning its form as it did so. {See L. Bouyer, Eucharistie. Theologie et spiritualite de la priere eucharistique (Tournai 1966)} […]
“In this sense liturgy always imposed an obligatory form on the individual congregation and the individual celebrant. […] The obligatory character of the essential parts of the liturgy also guarantees the true freedom of the faithful: it makes sure that they are not victims of something fabricated by an individual or group, that they are sharing in the same liturgy that binds the priest, the bishop and the pope. In the liturgy, we are all given the freedom to appropriate, in our own personal way, the mystery which addresses us.
“It is also worth observing here that the ‘creativity’ involved in manufactured liturgies has a very restricted scope. It is poor indeed compared with the wealth of the received liturgy in its hundreds and thousands of years of history. Unfortunately, the originators of homemade liturgies are slower to become aware of this than the participants. Furthermore, those able to draw up such liturgies are necessarily few in number, with the results that what is ‘freedom’ for them means ‘domination’ as it affects others.” (The Feast of Faith, 66-68)
It seems to me that here the Pope is criticizing not so much the official reform, as the creative local adaptations that followed upon it (“Hey, let’s replace the penitential rite with snippets from the New York Time“). Of course part of his point, which he made in another of the quotations above, is that the degree of change brought about by the official reform encouraged an attitude of “hey, if those guys in Rome can make up a liturgy, why can’t we here in Scarsdale?”
“Lamentably, the magnificent work done in [the field of interiorization of the liturgy and of liturgical formation] by men like Romano Guardini and Pius Parsch has been thrown into the wastepaper basket with the advent of new books. Thank God there are signs that the inheritance bequeathed by these great liturgical teachers is being rediscovered and carried forward. True liturgical formation cannot be achieved by a continual stream of new ideas and new forms. We need to be led from the form to the content. In other words, we need an education which will help us to grow into an inner appropriation of the Church’s common liturgy. This is the only way to get beyond the profusion of words and explanations which tear the liturgy to pieces and ultimately explain nothing.” (The Feast of Faith, 70-71)
I tend to agree with him here, but would simply note that many of the efforts of advocates of the Reform of the Reform, not to mention the new translation, are experienced by the people in the pews as “a continual stream of new ideas and new forms.” The liturgical fidgets that plague us are perpetrated as much by reformers on the right as by those on the left.
“I must add, though it conflicts with the accepted view, that it is not essential for the entire canon of the Mass to be recited aloud on every occasion. The idea that it must rests on a misunderstanding of its nature as proclamation. Where a community has undergone the requisite process of liturgical education, the congregation is well acquainted with the component parts of the Church’s eucharistic prayer. In such a case it is only necessary to pray aloud the first few words of each section of the prayer — the headings, as it were; in this way the congregation’s participation (and hence the quality of proclamation) will be often far greater than when its internal appropriation of the words is stifled by an uninterrupted loud recitation.
“The unhappy multiplication of eucharistic prayers which we see in other countries and which has long been under way here too [in Germany] is symptomatic of a very serious situation […] the demand for ‘variety’ [which is] insatiable, however much these eucharistic prayers may proliferate.” (The Feast of Faith, 72-73)
Sorry, but the first paragraph strikes me as nonsensical. The great advocate of liturgical continuity is here advocating a practice that, to my knowledge, is without precedent. The end of silent prayers have been said aloud, but the beginning? And the idea that the “internal appropriation of the words is stifled” by actually hearing the words spoken? The Pope is a very good theologian, but quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus.
It is not completely without precedent: the words “Nobis quoque peccatoribus” of the Canon are said aloud. Granted, that was for a different purpose than Ratzinger was proposing, but it was done.
I don’t find the idea that outlandish — I find it very difficult (at times) to do anything other than listen to the words being spoken by the priest when they are being spoken aloud; I have trouble meditating on them, “riffing” on them in my own silent prayer, etc. I think Ratzinger’s idea is akin to saying “Blessed is the man” or “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” or “The Lord is my shepherd” and letting the informed listener fill in the rest.
I have to admit that I have grown to appreciate the quiet canon over the last five years of celebrating the EF Mass. At first I was quite uncomfortable with it, but now realize that it has some strength to it. The Orate Fratres (the two words) also are said out loud with the remainder quiet. Of course one can now say the canon quietly in the EF but if wearing a microphone it is heard. However, I still contend that we have to read Cardinal Ratzinger in an unofficial way using personal opinion to make a point, not teaching what should be done, but proposing and what Pope Benedict does and teaches which has a different authority although obviously there are different levels of papal authority. His style of praying the Canon today (and I’ve heard him pray 1,2 and 3 is to read it dispassionately not as though he is proclaiming it to congregation as a lector reading the Scriptures, but as though he is actually praying it.
Deacon Fritz: Sorry, but the first paragraph strikes me as nonsensical. The great advocate of liturgical continuity is here advocating a practice that, to my knowledge, is without precedent. The end of silent prayers have been said aloud, but the beginning?
This was a very common practice with the Pater Noster in the pre-1962 liturgy e.g. in the absolution after a Requiem and in the office.
As Fr. MacDonald points out, Oratre Fratres is another example. So too the priest’s “Domine non sum dignus…” I believe, though I’m not 100% certain without checking.
Jeffrey: It is not completely without precedent: the words “Nobis quoque peccatoribus” of the Canon are said aloud.
Jeffrey, I was going to write that too, but note that, as Fritz points out, that’s the end of a silent prayer, not the beginning.
Samuel, I thought by “the end of silent prayers” he was referring specifically to things like “… in saecula saeculorum” or “… per Christum Dominum nostrum.”
I consider the “Nobis quoque” to be different because it is the first group of words of a longer prayer (within a prayer). I know that these words were said aloud as a signal to minor clerics that the Canon was winding down, but the fact remains that the opening words of a sub-prayer were chosen, rather than the closing words of a previous sub-prayer (e.g. “indulgeas, deprecamur” from the Memento etiam).
Jeffrey, you’re right, I misread your comment. Sorry about that!
I’m always amused to hear traditionalists defend the silent recitations of the Roman canon, but then are quick to praise the Mass of Gregory the Great’s as the liturgical ideal.
In Gregory’s day the canon of the Mass was recited out loud. I don’t think there were any offertory prayers at the altar.
but then are quick to praise the Mass of Gregory the Great’s as the liturgical ideal.
Like who?
I clearly didn’t know what I was talking about with regard to reciting only the beginning of prayers (I actually know about the things that people mentioned, but clearly that part of my brain was not engaged). I still think the reason given for his suggestion doesn’t hold water.
+1 Fritz. The argument for the mostly silent canon is a stack of rationalizations, express or implied, that are not very persuasive.
Ratzinger re-addresses this issue in The Spirit of the Liturgy pages 214-216. In particular:
“In 1978, to the annoyance of many liturgists, I said that in no sense does the whole Canon always have to be said out loud. […] It is no accident that in Jerusalem, from a very early time, parts of the Canon were prayed in silence and that in the West the silent Canon — overlaid in part with meditative singing — became the norm. To dismiss all this as the result of misunderstandings is just too easy. It really is not true that reciting the whole EP out loud and without interruptions is a prerequisite for the participation of everyone in this central act of the Mass.
“My suggestion in 1978 was as follows. First, liturgical education ought to aim at making the faithful familiar with the essential meaning and fundamental orientation of the Canon. Secondly, the first words of the various prayers should be said out loud as a kind of cue for the congregation, so that each individual in his silent prayer can take up the intonation and bring the personal into the communal and the communal into the personal.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 214-215)
It is no accident that in Jerusalem, from a very early time, parts of the Canon were prayed in silence and that in the West the silent Canon — overlaid in part with meditative singing — became the norm.
————————————–
I don’t know how “early” cardinal Ratzinger had in mind, but I think well into the 5th century most of the anaphora was recited. The Copts still chant most of their anaphora of St. Basil.
“Liturgy does not come about through regulation. One of the weaknesses of the postconciliar liturgical reform can doubtless be traced to the armchair strategy of academics, drawing up things on paper which, in fact, would presuppose years of organic growth. The most blatant example of this is the reform of the Calendar: those responsible simply did not realize how much the various annual feasts had influenced Christian people’s relation to time. In redistributing these established feasts throughout the year according to some inconsistently applied historical arithmetic, they ignored a fundamental law of religious life.” (The Feast of Faith, 81-82)
“In the wake of the Council a lot of things happened far too quickly and abruptly, with the result that many of the faithful could not see the inner continuity with what had gone before. In part it is simply a fact that the Council was pushed aside. For instance, it had said that the language of the Latin Rite was to remain Latin, although suitable scope was to be given to the vernacular. Today we might ask: Is there a Latin Rite at all any more? Certainly there is not awareness of it. To most people the liturgy seems to be rather something for the individual congregation to arrange. Core groups make up their own ‘liturgies’ from week to week, with an enthusiasm which is as amazing as it is misplaced. […] The distinctions between liturgy and conviviality, liturgy and society, are blurred. Thus many priests, following the etiquette of polite society, feel that they must not receive Communion until all the other has been ‘served’; or they no longer feel able to say ‘I bless you‘ and so dissolve the basic liturgical relationship between priest and people.” (The Feast of Faith, 84-85)
Again, he seems to be making the point is that the problem with the official reform is not so much what it produced directly (though that is not above criticism — see his remarks above about the calendar as well as the quotation Jeff gives following this one — but rather what it produced indirectly: an anarchic creativity.
The critique seems two-pronged. One the one hand, “regulation” by experts is bad because it is not organic. On the other hand, grassroots developments are bad because they are anarchic. It seems as if the idea of organic development is intended to rein in the anarchy without empowering liturgical experts to tinker with the liturgy. I’m not convinced, however, that this gives you anything more than total stasis.
The critique seems two-pronged. One the one hand, “regulation” by experts is bad because it is not organic. On the other hand, grassroots developments are bad because they are anarchic. It seems as if the idea of organic development is intended to rein in the anarchy without empowering liturgical experts to tinker with the liturgy. I’m not convinced, however, that this gives you anything more than total stasis.
My suspicion is that Benedict may have been influenced by Newman and the idea of development of doctrine.
From my little knowledge of Newman, my understanding of Newman’s notion was that by repeatedly thinking about an idea we are able to bring out all its implications and actually come to understand it better than we did at first. In that way Newman kept the notion of continuity, the idea was really there in the beginning, however there was change, we understand it and its implications more fully.
I suspect Benedict thinks that our organic development of the liturgy should always be bringing out more fully a reality which was there in the beginning, and hence in some ways all editions of the Missal are really editions of a kind of ideal Missal that was there implicitly in the beginning.
Fritz, he also overstates how much discontinuity was perceived. It’s a natural overstatement, because those who perceived it will tend to be a lot louder than those who did not, and his experience of this shift was primarily as a cleric, not as a layperson, shall we say. Again, one sees his musings on liturgy are probably better read as watercolors – pay more attention to the the general thrust rather than particular criticisms.
And add to that, his experience is not pastoral – with a couple of year exception (which he spent outside of the diocese more than in the diocese) he has never led an actual pastoral situation – he has never lived and worked in mission lands.
This impacts what he says – his experience is part of the curia; strongly hierarchical/institutional; out of a European mindset; he is not a liturgical expert.
Sorry, have we come back to the subject of MR3 so quickly?
Again – his personal opinion:
“it is simply a fact that the Council was pushed aside. For instance, it had said that the language of the Latin Rite was to remain Latin, although suitable scope was to be given to the vernacular.”
As we now know from the minutes, internal debates, and Consilium – his statement skews the reality and is not nuanced; thus, a false generalization.
This goes along with other commenters noting discrepancies e.g. Paul Inwood’s on “abrogation of former missals”; fabrication; calendar remark (conferences of bishops pushed for this); organic development.
In some ways, his three written works merely express personal opinions and, at times, disappointment with how things developed. Would suggest that many share the thought that there were “unintended consequences” but not sure many would agree with his solutions.
Bill, it is precisely from his opinions and disappointments that we determine what and whom he criticizes regarding the liturgical reform following Vatican II.
JP – you repeated what I just said but missed my last point – WHO decides?
Scroll down – you have folks such as Fr. Allan who want to bring back the 1962 missal and begin a process to consolidate the “best elements into a new missal? B16 has created unintended consequences (over episcopal objections) with the SP and those who have blown this out of proportion and his unclear “mutual enhancement”.
Well – VII already did that but if you “re-opened the door”, who would do that? another council? the pope through a committee – geez, another New Translation experience? As you study VII preparatory notes, you can see that numerous committees (ecumenical, ecclesiology, scripture, missions, etc.) weighed in – this goes way beyond just liturgy or CDW. Really wonder what the “worldwide” bishops would say about whether the 1962 missal was abrogated? what would they say about EF and SP? what would they say about “organic”; “fabricated”; etc.
Appears that we are replacing decades of work and conciliar decisions with personal opinions or pressure from small minority groups? Some here don’t want liturgical experts; some do; some want pastoral input but not as far as input from third world liturgical experience? Look at the examples raise here to date – silent canon?; ad orientem?; benedictine style?; kneeling for communion?; how much latin and when/where?; etc.
This comes from the topic just posted by Fr. Ruff – different issue but the process/approach has lots in common as does this bishop’s statement (would substitute “at a standstill” and insert “polarized” for liturgy issue:
“In the spirit of the Council, the Church must come up with a plan. I will certainly not say what, but I do say that we must begin to discuss this seriously… The question cannot be brushed aside any more, but presently everything is at a standstill.”
Bishop Kräutler does not consider a gathering of bishops in Rome to be the appropriate means. He thinks it would make more sense to poll all the bishops of the entire world. “What is your opinion, what do you think of this, what do your people say? Talk to the priests, the religious, the laity. Have a meeting and formulate your opinion.”
The bishop believes that the “pulse of the universal Church” should be taken, and taken seriously. “We believe that the Spirit of God is with all of us, not just with one person.” He advocates forming some sort of committee after the polling, “with the Pope and under the Pope,” which would see whether there is need for a new council or some other representative assembly.”
“Lest there be any misunderstanding, let me add that as far as its content is concerned (apart from a few criticisms), I am very grateful for the new Missal, for the way it has enriched the treasure of prayers and prefaces, for the new EPs and the increased number of texts for use on weekdays, etc., quite apart from the availability of the vernacular. But I do regard it as unfortunate that we have been presented with the idea of a new book rather than with that of continuity within a single liturgical history. In my view, a new edition will need to make it quite clear that the so-called Missal of Paul VI is nothing other than a renewed form of the same Missal to which Pius X, Urban VIII, Pius V and their predecessors have contributed, right from the Church’s earliest history.” (The Feast of Faith, 87)
Many thanks, Jeffrey, for these extracts from our Holy Father’s works. They are a potent reminder that there is much more to this pope than the Extra-ordinary Form, or the objects of many of the complaints against him. In fact, when reading his works and teachings, one is rather bemused at all the fault found with him. We should be thankful that we have him. (Nor am I anywhere near to being a partisan of the Tridentine resurgence, and have something akin to contempt for the ultra-montane bent that seems to follow in its wake.) Leaving aside the limited validity of many of the complainants on this blog, they usually remind me of the quip about the old Protestant who was asked if he believed in papal infallibility: his response? ‘Certainly not! Then I would have to give up my own infallibility’. Much fruitful discussion should issue from what you have shared with us. Certainly, a more balanced and rational assessment of Benedicts papacy, ministry, and legacy.
Unfortunately Joseph Ratzinger is not a liturgist. Like Gamber, cited above, he is self-taught, and it shows up in statements such as this one, quoted by Jeffrey
I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy.
Against that mis-statement I place this comment of the late liturgical scholar Pierre Jounel, which I think I have quoted before on this blog:
Except its quite a bit more complicated tham that, isn’t it? In the first place, the Tridentine reform didn’t impose complete uniformity.
The revised Pian psalter was in fact optional when it was introduced. The list excludes other reforms (e.g .the Vatican edition of the chant) that were not obligitory.
Paul, I’m not sure how you are defining the term “liturgist,” but I think by most definitions Gamber fits the bill (as much as I disagree with him on some matters).
1. I never cease to be amazed at the credentialism – and that’s really what you’re engaged in here, Mr. Inwood – employed by academic theologians in general and by liturgists in particular to dismiss criticisms of their work, especially from more traditional postures. If once upon a time it was the letters in front of the advocate’s name that matter, now, it seems, it is the letters after it that matter. It’s hardly an improvement.
Joseph Ratzinger is/was a tenured theologian at some of the best schools of theology in Europe, and he has written at some length on topics liturgical, even if it has not been the main focus of his academic career. A blithe dismissal of him as “self-taught,” as “not a liturgist” – and therefore apparently to be disregarded, even setting aside his titles and positions in the Church – gives off the whiff of a new form of clericalism to replace the old.
2. Your substantive point is, as Sam points out, problematic. His points about the Pian psalter and the Pius V missal aside, the fundamental problem is that, psalter aside (which was a fundamentally new psalter), these missals (yes, even the 1955 missal with its Holy Week reforms) were really only very minor revisions of the same missal, and recognizable as such. St. Pius V did not change so much as codify the Roman Rite as it already existed in 1570 (and had existed, with little change, for centuries before).
The Paul VI missal is plainly seen by Ratzinger as something quite new, a new missal altogether, even if it draws from some aspects of the old missals for its structure and prayers. And, reading Paul VI’s proclamation, it seems evident that he viewed it in this manner as well.
Jounel’s comment has applicability only insofar as it relates to the papal authority being deployed to proclaim and require (in any respect) the use of a missal or psalter. Otherwise, these examples have as much in common as cheese and chalk.
One final point: If the writings of Joseph Ratzinger, theologian, seem to evince a view of the Pauline missal as a fundamentally new missal, Joseph Ratzinger the Pope clearly states that the Pauline missal is merely one of two basic forms of the Roman Rite (Summorum Pontificum Art. 1).
This has always struck me, as it has others, as a kind of polite juridical fiction, necessary to make a sufficiently compelling case for the affirmation that the traditional Roman Rite was “never abrogated.” And I suspect that Joseph Ratzinger the Pope believes it to be a juridical fiction. If it is indeed the same Rite, the fact must be confronted that keeping an earlier and a later form of the same Rite is, with a few arguable exceptions, without real precedent in the West. And apparently, the Holy Father did not wish to deal with such an argument in 2007, or at any time since.
Thanks, Jeffrey, for all your work in this.
There are major problems with the organic development metaphor. I wonder if R has addressed some of these.
1. With Karl, I would say that organic stopped in the West with Trent, the invention of the printing press and centralization of government in the Curia. Everything since has been artificial and bureaucratic. The slow piecemeal bureaucratic changes under P12 were not any more organic than the fast paced changes after V2. Indeed all notions of “say the black, do the red,” “that even a priest cannot change anything in the liturgy,” are modern bureaucratic rather than organic growth notions.
2. The Orthodox liturgy still contains some organic features. The very extensive Byzantine Liturgy gets abbreviated by the Bishops and even pastors. The extensive options in the OF is a way of allowing some organic development (adaptation to the environment) within a menu produced by a bureaucracy. Adaptation to the environment is key to a true organic model, and subsidiarity (adaptation through changes at lower levels rather than higher levels) is essential to being organic. Does R have any thoughts on these issues?
3. An organic model must face the problem that there is bad growth along with good growth, and that the bad growth was not simply a matter of “accretions.” Simply said, the West has suffered far more than the East from clericalism which led to the private Mass and the private Divine Office (which still remains even after V2). That clericalism also deprived the people of the resource of Scripture through lack of a vernacular liturgy. What precisely does R think needed to have been reformed about the liturgy and why?
4. The Reform of the Liturgy after V2 brought us the three year cycle of Scripture readings and the common lectionary. This was certainly not organic development; but many people see it as one of the most valuable parts of the liturgical reform. What does R think of the 3 yr cycle?
Is a liturgical context the best place to encounter scripture? My perception of the triennial lectionaries has been that we are given three decontextualised fragments of scripture with a dismembered psalm at Mass: I wouldn’t call the lectionary a triumph of the recovery of scripture.
In the liturgy of the hours we do have the opportunity to engage with the psalms, but their repetition in the context of the liturgy would mean that if we laity participated in the l.o.t.h. in English or Latin the outcome of the encounter would be the same.
The best place to encounter scripture is in reading and study.
The rearrangement of the Kalendar, together with the triennial lectionary has left most of the laity divorced from the liturgical year and no closer to scripture.
On most Sundays, the Psalm responds to the First Reading, which is a foreshadowing of or precursor to the Gospel Reading. The Second Reading is less easy to place, since it is sequentially chosen from the epistles.
However, that’s not always the case on solemnities or Sundays in Advent/Lent/Easter, and the weekday cycle is mostly sequential.
There is a lot that could be done to improve the arrangement of the readings at Mass.
I’ve always thought that the Office is the best place for a regular encounter of scripture.
In the Mass, there is something to be said for . . . depth over breadth.
I have the impression, however, that of the aspects of the Pauline missal that he *is* a fan of is the new three year lectionary. It’s unlikely to go away anytime soon.
Jeffrey,
Yes, I am aware that the selected readings are a work of art: as a combination the epistle and old testament readings always serve to amplify the gospel readings, but how much do we laity (especially when, say, wrangling small children, being distracted by last week’s crisis at work, thinking about the meatloaf in the oven etc) actually digest the feast laid before us at Mass? And the plain fact is, we neither get enough of the texts to give us an appreciation of them nor get familiar with regularly repeated texts for them to be meaningful.
As I said above, I don’t believe that Mass is a context conducive to giving people a familiarity with the breadth of sacred scripture currently included in the lectionary. Speaking personally, I particularly hate the truncated psalms that we are given at Mass.
Thomas,
You mean the proper antiphons?
The question that I raised was what was R’s opinion of the three year lectionary.
I realized there are some people out there who do not like it; certainly it existence has caused deep trouble for the Propers. On the other hand, many people like myself think it is a very good thing. For many people with that opinion. R’s notion of organic development would be hard to square with such a large positively valued change.
In some ways the change was not so large, depending upon where in history you look. Most liturgical scholars seem to be of the opinion that the lectionary was originally sequential since so many of the Church Fathers wrote so many commentaries on books of the Bible. Is this one of the areas where R rejects going back to earlier practices as a model. Actually what was done was a compromise: the earlier practice of sequential reading for the Epistle and Gospel with the later practice of a non sequential OT reading parallel to the Gospel theme. One could argue that the choice optimized the best of the old and new.
As I commented on the Julia Smucker excellent Contours of the Catholic Mind post
https://praytell.blog/index.php/2012/05/21/contours-of-the-catholic-mind/#comment-256033
one can get very different opinions of liturgy, all of which take the long view, are both/and, and view tradition as a living process. The lectionary appears to an excellent example.
I would still like to know if R ever voiced an objection to the new lectionary. The new lectionary poses a real problem for organic development unless you accept that you can go back to an earlier stage. Even then, it is quite a change.
Often renewal in the religious life has taken place because of an appeal to an earlier stage in the development of a religious order. In fact V2 specifically asked religious orders to review their mission in light of the founder’s ideals, while talking into account modern conditions and needs. I would call that organic development but R might not.
Well stated, Jack. You hit the nail on the head – organic development has meant and looked differently throughout our history. Jungmann’s Mass of the Roman Rite does an excellent job of showing how “organic” development happened – sometimes is was very gradual; other times it was abrupt.
Reading thru JP’s posted excerpts, I only get a confusing read from R – he appears to say contradictory things?
Thanks Jeffrey. I really do believe that most of the complaints about the revised Mass have to do with later “theological” tinkering rather than the actual Mass and its GIRM and rubrics, although many of us feel that the GIRM and rubrics need a little bit more direction for certain things that would close loopholes. But the problem with the Mass, any Mass, EF or OF or whatever is how it is celebrated.
My experience of visiting churches on vacation is abysmal. Lectors are ill prepared, poorly dressed. Altar servers are clueless about what they should do and are a distraction. The priest is too folksy and seems more intent on entertaining rather than praying. There is sloppiness rather than attention to detail. Music is abysmal. New architecture and renovation of old churches leaves much to be desired and is uninspiring. Perhaps Cardinal Ratzinger and his later more official self as Pope is really dealing with what so many of us in the 1970’s and 80’s experienced–we went to workshops, saw unusual things modeled for us at liturgical events celebrated there and dragged them back to the parish. We allowed (I include myself here) so-called experts to direct the implementation of a future view of the liturgy that the 1970 missal never intended if celebrated by the book.
“In 1918, the year that Guardini published his book [The Spirit of the Liturgy], the liturgy was rather like a fresco. It had been preserved from damage, but it had been almost completely overlaid with whitewash by later generations. In the MIssal from which the priest celebrated, the form of the liturgy that had grown from its earliest beginnings was still present, but, as far as the faithful were concerned, it was largely concealed beneath instructions for and forms of private prayer. The fresco was laid bare by the Liturgical Movement and, in a definitive way, by the Second Vatican Council. For a moment its colors and figures fascinated us.
“But since then the fresco has been endangered by climatic conditions as well as by various restorations and reconstructions. In fact, it is threatened with destruction, if the necessary steps are not taken to stop these damaging influences. Of course, there must be no question of its being covered with whitewash again, but what is imperative is a new reverence in the way we treat it, a new understanding of its message and its reality, so that rediscovery does not become the first stage of irreparable loss.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 7-8 [Preface])
“For the Liturgy of the Word is about speaking and responding, and so a face-to-face exchange between proclaimer and hearer makes sense. […] On the other hand, a common turning to the east during the EP remains essential. […]
“Haussling has levelled several objections at these ideas of mine. […] These ideas are alleged to be a romanticism for the old ways, a misguided longing for the past. It is said to be odd that I should speak only of Christian antiquity and pass over the succeeding centuries. Coming as it does from a liturgical scholar, this objection is quite remarkable. As I see it, the problem with a large part of modern liturgiology is that it tends to recognize only antiquity as a source, and therefore normative, and to regard everything developed later, in the Middle Ages and through the Council of Trent, as decadent.
“And so one ends up with dubious reconstructions of the most ancient practice, fluctuating criteria, and never-ending suggestions for reform, which lead ultimately to the disintegration of the liturgy that has evolved in a living way. On the other hand, it is important and necessary to see that we cannot take as our norm the ancient in itself and as such, nor must we automatically write off later developments as alien to the original form of the liturgy. There can be a thoroughly living kind of development in which a seed at the origin of something ripens and bears fruit.” (The Spirit of the Liturgy, 81-82)
My final observation on all of this is what Pope Benedict’s MC said of him a few years back in terms of the “reform of the reform” of the liturgy–that the Holy Father’s style (I suspect meaning Joseph Ratzinger) is to propose not mandate. Certainly everything that he has proposed has created discussion here and elsewhere and for the past seven years or so of his papacy. Is this where “organic development” occurs first and isn’t it interesting that it isn’t done just in the realm of “bishops and their theologian advisers” but now with rank and file Catholics and their priests and parishes. Is this an example of post-Vatican II ecclesiology that will eventually lead to the third Roman Missal which might be more in harmony with both missals (1970 and 1962) that preceded it. Just wondering. There is a genius in the Holy Father’s decision to make the 1962 missal a part of this conversation. This conversation here which includes the 1962 missal could never have taken place even six years ago.
The fact is that the Council Fathers must have considered the 1962 Missal to be deficient, otherwise they would have deliberately excluded it from the widesweeping liturgical reforms that they mandated.
The Council therefore sees particularly cogent reasons for undertaking the reform and promotion of the liturgy. (SC 1)
Wherefore the sacred Council judges that the following principles concerning the promotion and reform of the liturgy should be called to mind, and that practical norms should be established. (SC 3)
GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR THE RESTORATION AND PROMOTION OF THE SACRED LITURGY (SC, Chapter I heading)
In the restoration and promotion of the sacred liturgy, this full and active participation by all the people is the aim to be considered before all else; (SC 14)
III. The Reform of the Sacred Liturgy
21. In order that the Christian people may more certainly derive an abundance of graces from the sacred liturgy, holy Mother Church desires to undertake with great care a general restoration of the liturgy itself. For the liturgy is made up of immutable elements divinely instituted, and of elements subject to change. These not only may but ought to be changed with the passage of time if they have suffered from the intrusion of anything out of harmony with the inner nature of the liturgy or have become unsuited to it.
In this restoration, both texts and rites should be drawn up so that they express more clearly the holy things which they signify; the Christian people, so far as possible, should be enabled to understand them with ease and to take part in them fully, actively, and as befits a community.
(SC 21)
The liturgical books are to be revised as soon as possible; (SC 25)
The revision of the liturgical books (SC 31)
Wherefore, in the revision of the liturgy, the following general norms should be observed: (SC 33)
Provision shall also be made, when revising the liturgical books, for legitimate variations and adaptations to different groups, regions, and peoples, especially in mission lands, provided that the substantial unity of the Roman rite is preserved; (SC 38)
In some places and circumstances, however, an even more radical adaptation of the liturgy is needed,….. Adaptations which are judged to be useful or necessary…. To ensure that adaptations may be made with all the circumspection which they demand (SC 40)
The rite of the Mass is to be revised in such a way that the intrinsic nature and purpose of its several parts, as also the connection between them, may be more clearly manifested, and that devout and active participation by the faithful may be more easily achieved.
For this purpose the rites are to be simplified, due care being taken to preserve their substance; elements which, with the passage of time, came to be duplicated, or were added with but little advantage, are now to be discarded; other elements which have suffered injury through accidents of history are now to be restored to the vigor which they had in the days of the holy Fathers, as may seem useful or necessary. (SC 50)
Especially on Sundays and feasts of obligation there is to be restored, after the Gospel and the homily, “the common prayer” or “the prayer of the faithful.” (SC 53)
And so on and on. Why bother to say all of this if you think everything in the garden is rosy? This was a call for reform, revision and restoration of the existing rites. Therefore what currently existed was considered inadequate. To reinstate in 2007 something that had previously been considered inadequate and deficient was nothing less than bizarre, and it is hard to believe that Josef Ratzinger did not remember what the Council Fathers had mandated. If he did remember, he chose to ignore it. History will judge how intelligent that decision was.
Evidently, they didn’t think that the garden was rosy,but I think it is debatable, at least for the Mass, whether they expected it to be as sweeping as it eventually was. For example, most of the revisions mentioned in the “Declaratio” attached to explain no. 50 were fulfilled with Inter Oecumenici, and the revised 1965 Ritus Servandus and the 1965 Ordo Missae. The two things that were not were the revision of the Offertory prayers and the realignment of the pre-Communion prayers.
And we have the opinions of others (Msgr. Wardsworth included) who suggest that many contemporary celebrations of the EF actually implement more of SC’s directives than too many OF celebrations do. True, there are no bidding prayers in the EF nor does it have a three-year cycle of readings but it does preserve Latin (SC54) and avoids notable differences between the rites used in adjacent regions (SC23). Considering the fact that the council was speaking to the whole world we may consider that the sung or dialogue EF Mass popular with many liturgists in the 1960s was the ideal that much of SC was pushing the rest of the Latin Rite toward. Reading SC in that light may bring the reader to a different realization than one who imagines that the council fathers sought a wholesale rewrite of the existing liturgy. On that point, all we have to remember is the number of highly conservative prelates who voted for SC. Their number included Archbishop Lefebvre.
re: Shane Maher on June 6, 2012 – 4:02 am
Shane, I think you’re being a bit optimistic about the possibility of a Prayer of the Faithful and the future of the dialogue Mass in today’s EF culture. Personally, I would welcome a restoration of a litany along the lines of the opening litany of St. John Chrysostom after the Domine vobiscum and oremus before the offertory. Still, knowing EF culture today, that’s a distant possibility. Heck, I was at EF solemn Mass last Sunday, and got stared down by another parishioner for making the sung responses with the choir. Okay, I’m not a brilliant singer. Still, the responses are supposed to be sung by the people and choir. I’ve also found that I get stares for making the altar servers’ responses at low Mass in an low but audible voice. So much for SC‘s call for active participation. Perhaps a conscious lack of verbal participation at EF Masses is oppositional defiance, as if knowing and voicing the Latin responses is “novus ordo”?
I agree with Joshua Vas that the 1964/5 Missal did fulfill most of SC‘s requirements (though it’s important to know that the Benzinger transitional missal for the United States still had some proper prayers in Latin as well as a silent Canon Missae). I don’t see why the 1965 interim missal ad orientem should be a problem for traditionalists, but many in the EF community fear than any vernacularization is a slippery slope to an all-vernacular, versus populum liturgy. Do I agree? No, I find this position a bit hysterical and reactionary. This is the way it appears from the ground; change any time soon is unlikely in my opinion.
Paul, having a new generation of Catholics familiar with the 1962 missal allows that new generation of Catholics to judge the 1962 missal in light of what you quote from Vatican II through their own lens rather than just the lens of those who wrote this document. It also allows allow us to critique the 1970 missal in a similar fashion, especially its implementation. Both missals are not immune from revision and thus a more organic revised missal might just develop from the critique of both which maintains the best of both while eliminating the chaff–who knows?
Notice – they completely “miss” your point, Paul. For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.
Why? because their study, research, experience, and expertise (including feedback and needs from their own people) asked for restoration, reform, revisions.
Would suggest that “tinkering” with the liturgy and our ritual requires more than just “arbitrary” changes. (e.g. read Fr. Allan’s blog if you want to be alarmed)
Funny – some here consistently complain about some memories from their distant past e.g. clown masses, made up eucharistic prayers, etc. Now, based upon what? they want to take the 1962 missal/TLM and decide how best to blend everything together. This would be like asking first year graduate students in history to take an early US Narrative History book (filled with myths, inaccuracies, apacrophya stories, political biases, no access to primary sources, etc. – rather just a summary based upon what that writer thought he/she knew at that time) and begin to write current history.
Talk about a rejection of “organic” development – it feels more like SP has given some license to repeat from their “side” the mistakes they are so critical of in the 1970-80s (which were, by the way, few and far between).
“Notice – they completely “miss” your point, Paul. For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.
Why? because their study, research, experience, and expertise (including feedback and needs from their own people) asked for restoration, reform, revisions.)”–Bill Dehass
No Vatican II did not abrogate the 1962 missal!
The group that advised Pope Paul VI about the revision of the Mass didn’t abrogate the 1962 missal either.
It is debatable if Pope Paul VI did so.
But it is clear that Pope Benedict XVI eliminated any doubt whatsoever not only in theory but in practice with SP, regardless of the controversy and angst it has created in a particular segment of the Church.
Bill if you weren’t alarmed over my blog, I would say you’ve had a pretty powerful conversion experience, but sadly no sign of that yet! 😉
Still making it up as you go along – just like your blog. Thought you said above on June 5th – 8:40AM – “My final observation on all of this…..”
You state: “No Vatican II did not abrogate the 1962 missal! The group that advised Pope Paul VI about the revision of the Mass didn’t abrogate the 1962 missal either. It is debatable if Pope Paul VI did so.”
Can you prove that? Have you ever read Bugnini’s autobiography, notes from many of the Consilium participants; Paul VI’s presentation when he presented/approved the new missal – he clearly abrogated the EF and the ’62 missal.
Your opinion and the solitary pronouncements of B16 also don’t make it correct. Noted that you make this statement and quickly move on and say it is a moot point given B16’s SP – which confirms my later points about what folks with your symapathies are doing. You use a late and questionnable papal intervention to justify your rewriting of history.
The vast majority of bishops and conferences would not agree with your statement.
A comparison – Council of Trent also reformed the mass and the missal. (let’s not get hung up on the “200 year rite exemptions e.g. Sarum) Some say it was a mild revision but, in reality, historians note that it truly was a positive and needed reform (not reaction) in the context of a response to the Reformation. Thus, requirements, rigor, read the black/do the red. Just like now – Trent was followed by two popes who delayed and retrenched the liturgical reforms of the council. We are mainly talking about Europe (the catholic world at that time) and liturgical reform esp. in France (French hierarchy resisted using pre-Trentan missals, regional rubrics (rites?), etc.) did not happen for over 50 years with a new generation of bishops and reformers such a Berulle, Vincent dePaul, etc. who gathered priests into communities to do missions; catechize using the Trentan reformed liturgies. (interesting that the majority of SSPX is concentrated in France and French episcopal conferences were deadset against SP.)
Go backwards, doomed to repeat history rather than learn from it – Paul says it well at today at 9:31 AM.
You might want to check JP’s copy from B16’s Milestones book on June 4th – 7:16 PM:
“….the publication of the Missal of Paul VI, which was accompanied by the almost total prohibition, after a transitional phase of only half a year, of using the missal we had had until then. I welcomed the fact that now we had a binding liturgical text after a period of experimentation that had often deformed the liturgy. But I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy.”
Now, there appears to be a difference of opinion and even experts disagree with his final line …..”nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy…” and he goes on to rewrite what happened in 1570. Would suggest that his is a minority opinion on the “entire history”.
Here are the two pronouncements by Paul VI:
Address of Pope Paul VI to a General Audience, November 19, 1969
Before the introduction of the new Mass in 1969 Pope Paul VI gave two addresses in which he made some startling admissions about the new liturgy – this is the first of those addresses.
“……The reform which is about to be brought into being is therefore a response to an authoritative mandate from the Church. It is an act of obedience. It is an act of coherence of the Church with herself. It is a step forward for her authentic tradition. It is a demonstration of fidelity and vitality, to which we all must give prompt assent.
It is not an arbitrary act. It is not a transitory or optional experiment. It is not some dilettante’s improvisation. It is a law. It has been thought out by authoritative experts of sacred Liturgy; it has been discussed and meditated upon for a long time. We shall do well to accept it with joyful interest and put it into practice punctually, unanimously and carefully.
This reform puts an end to uncertainties, to discussions, to arbitrary abuses. It calls us back to that uniformity of rites and feeling proper to the Catholic Church, the heir and continuation of that first Christian community, which was all “one single heart and a single soul” (Acts 4:32).
They might come to believe that the equation between the law of prayer, lex orandi and the law of faith, lex credendi, is compromised as a result. It is not so. Absolutely not. Above all, because the rite and the relative rubric are not in themselves a dogmatic definition. So do not let us talk about “the new Mass.” Let us rather speak of the “new epoch” in the Church’s life.
Second announcement: Paul VI, Address to a general audience, on the new ORDO MISSAE, 26 November1969:Notitiae 5 (1969) 412-416 (Italian) English translation, Documents on the Liturgy, 1963-1979 [ICEL] (The Liturgical Press, 1983)
“Clearly the most noticeable new departure is that of language. From now on the vernacular, not Latin, will be the principal language of the Mass. For those who appreciate the beauty of Latin, its power, and aptness to express the sacred, substitution of the vernacular certainly represents a great sacrifice. We are losing the idiom of the Christian ages; we become like profane intruders into the literary sanctuary of sacred language; we shall lose a large portion of that wonderful and incomparable, artistic and spiritual reality, Gregorian chant. We indeed have reason for sadness and perhaps even for bewilderment. What shall we put in the place of this angelic language? We are sacrificing a priceless treasure. For what reason? What is worth more than these sublime values of the Church? The answer may seem trite and prosaic, but it is sound because it is both human and apostolic. Our understanding of prayer is worth more than the previous, ancient garments in which it has been regally clad. Of more value, too, is the participation of the people, of modern people who are surrounded by clear, intelligible language …. If our sacred Latin should, like a thick curtain, close us off from the world of children and young people, of work and the business of everyday, then would we, fishers of men, be wise to allow it exclusive dominion over the speech of religion and prayer?”
So, confused by the “total certitude” that you have when you make statements? Or do we play a game in terms of which pope we pay attention to and when?
Bill you wrote: “For very good reasons, more than 1500 bishops abrogated the 1962 missal.”
That is simply false as Pope Paul VI issued on his own authority the 1970 missal but allowed the 1962 missal to be celebrated as an extraordinary need.
You make it sound like all the bishops of Vatican II at the time of Vatican II abrogated the 1962 missal. Just admit you made a historical mistake and didn’t mean to write what you wrote. That’s all it will take and I’ll be happy. 🙂
“The reform […] is a demonstration of fidelity and vitality, to which we all must give prompt assent.”
Said back in the days when you could say that. 😉
“This reform puts an end to uncertainties, to discussions, to arbitrary abuses.”
The Pope said it, so it must be true. 😉
“It calls us back to that uniformity of rites and feeling proper to the Catholic Church.”
Uniformity of rites? Not unity, but uniformity?
Just making some hump-day jabs at Paul VI. No harm intended.
Oh, so you have admitted that Paul did abrogate the missal – “Pope Paul VI issued on his own authority the 1970 missal but allowed the 1962 missal to be celebrated as an extraordinary need.”
But this contradicts your initial statement. Unless you think his “extraordinary need” means it wasn’t abrogated in which case you need to go back to canon law school. Or check June 5- 5:25 AM from Pierre Journel.
Yep, base my comment upon the fact that 1400+ bishops voted to reform the missal and clearly agreed that this would be done under Paul’s direction who then implemented Consilium. Your comment – “…..on his own authority the 1970” – guess you are implying that he did this alone and that it had no connection to the bishops at Vatican II? (really? you haven’t read much in terms of primary sources, documents, Consilium, private notes, journals, Alberigo history (5 volumes)?
You say – “bill, you make it sound as if 1400 bishops abrogated the missal” – yep, that is exactly what I am saying – there is more than enough linkage from the votes and approved directives in Vatican II to make that statement and linkage vs. your statement that somehow Paul VI acted in “isolation” (oh, that’s right – there is not spirit of VII”?) I also support my conviction by Paul Inwood’s latest comments about the actual history and development post 1965 – bishops were making requests, demands for even more changes – June 6 – 5:25AM:
“…advise those who think that the reforms as actually carried out were not those that the Council Fathers had in mind should read Piero Marini’s A Challenging Reform which documents in detail how the reforms that were actually implemented were precisely those that the bishops of the world (i.e. those same Council Fathers) very clearly asked for, once they had seen the pastoral potential of the reform. Indeed, the Consilium was hard pressed to keep up with the demands it was receiving from hierarchies across the globe.”
You end with: “Just admit you made a historical mistake and didn’t mean to write what you wrote. That’s all it will take and I’ll be happy.”
Who made the “historical” mistake? Since you appear to have little use for historical criticism or going any earlier than 1950, not sure I see your “certitude” or any understanding of history?
But of course the only four bishops thus far who have any real authority over promulgating the form of the Mass have also allowed for the 1962 missal to be celebrated in an extraordinary way, Paul VI, John Paul I (briefly of course) John Paul II who expanded what extraordinary meant, and Benedict XVI who expanded extraordinary in an extraordinary way.
Theologians can muse all they want and so can you and I but when push comes to shove the bishops of Rome call the shots which is extraordinary when they act alone infallibly which is not the case with the liturgical decisions they have thus far made which are a part of the Ordinary Magisterium of the Church even when they allowed the so-called abrogated 1962 missal to be celebrated under the term extraordinary.
JP – it really does get amusing.
Appears that you have two simplistic approaches here:
– no abrogation vs. abrogation (each side makes its own historical assertions and justifications quoting from applicable popes, experts, etc. but leaving or skipping over those who may not support their side – and this includes popes)
– too much restoration from before the Tridentine Rite vs. restoration that used the total experience of the church from 1st century on – truly organic. (each side makes up its own order of mass with claims and counterclaims about who skipped over what period of time; didn’t pay enough attention to which period’s accretions, etc.)
Agree – added Paul VI’s announcements given the original topic of this post. It gets to my initial comment about the phrasing of the questions – too dependent upon papal perogatives or as you stated – “The Pope said it, so it must be true” (or, per Allan, what you think the pope said)
To some of your highlighted sentences – keep in mind the audience Paul VI was speaking to on those two days; keep in mind the context, audience, time period, and tensions at that time. It puts a different spin on what you have humurously highlighted.
Will take that as your admission, Alllan, thanks.
The bishop of Rome never acts “alone’ infallibly
And only bishop of Rome has any real authority over promulgating the form of the Mass – where do you think that authority comes from? Does that mean a council doesn’t have “any real authority”? You might want to pull out your 1950’s catechism on these points.
Your hierarachical, militaristic model is showing itself.
But then there is this rub: “The Council also desires that, where necessary (not everywhere it seems), the rites be revised carefully in the light of sound tradition …” (SC 4).
While we’re being sticklers for accuracy, Lefebvre did not vote for SC. He was one of the tiny handful who didn’t.
Out of curiosity, what is the source for this claim?
Really? I thought he was one of the 2,147 who approved, not one of the four who objected.
Joshua and Paul,
I don’t know what Paul’s source for claiming that ++Lefebvre didn’t sign SC might have been but I believe Michael Davies claimed that he did sign SC and more recently we’ve seen information like this:
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/archbishop_lefebvre_signed_every_one_of_vatican_iis_documents/
I think that knowing that ++Lefebvre signed SC is problematic for progressives and arch-traditionalists alike. Progressive sometimes seem to take an approach suggesting that there is little reason for a conservative to find his views or piety sustained by the V2 documents. Arch-traditionalists similarly seem to prefer imagining that the traditional faith cannot be preserved by V2. Lefebvre may be proving both progressives and arch-traditionalists to be wrong with his signature.
Thought that John Page of the original ICEL said that he did vote for it.
Also, from Levebre’s biographer:
http://catholicforum.fisheaters.com/index.php?topic=1552114.0;wap2
Out of curiosity, what is the source for this claim?
Yves Congar, no less.
Voting for and signing are two different things, I believe.
The fact is that the Council Fathers must have considered the 1962 Missal to be deficient, otherwise they would have deliberately excluded it from the widesweeping liturgical reforms that they mandated.
OK… but that doesn’t mean that any particular reform they set out was neccesarily a good idea. Nor even that they (or those who tried to implement their ideas) didn’t neccesarily err in their judgment about particular parts of the liturgy.
Of course. But the sensible thing would then be to adapt and modify, moving forwards and learning from mistakes made. The indefensible thing is moving backwards to something which was, I am sure the Council Fathers would agree, worse than what came later.
People forget that the Liturgical Movement started in 19th-century France, was boosted by Beauduin in 1909, and thereafter progressed right up to Vatican II, thus ensuring that both the reforms that were mandated and their concrete implementation were the result of over half a century of solid scholarship. There was no hermeneutic of rupture — quite the reverse. Anyone who doubts this should read Keith Pecklers’ The Genius of the Roman Rite.
Further, I advise those who think that the reforms as actually carried out were not those that the Council Fathers had in mind should read Piero Marini’s A Challenging Reform which documents in detail how the reforms that were actually implemented were precisely those that the bishops of the world (i.e. those same Council Fathers) very clearly asked for, once they had seen the pastoral potential of the reform. Indeed, the Consilium was hard pressed to keep up with the demands it was receiving from hierarchies across the globe.
Yes, mistakes were inevitably made, but excessive speed in responding to the bishops’ demands may well have been a contributory factor, as well as excessive enthusiasm by practitioners who realized that the only way to find out how to do things well was to try them out and then tweak continually. What now seems incomprehensible is the desire to return to something which the Council Fathers had clearly defined as inadequate and deficient.
JP – there is not, to my knowlege. I’m not sure how exactly email exchange would work since this is a public board – but I have some scans I could send you.
In general, the 1967 schema is practically the same as the 1969 Ordo Missae. The main differences are in rubrics – several things were still somewhat up in the air, such as the position of a penitential rite, etc. To give an example, a proposal is either Kyrie OR Gloria, but not both. But in general, all the texts of the 1969 are more or less there, in the same order. There are a few oddities: the Indulgentiam and Quid retribuam are retained, the Blessing is still placed after the Dismissal. The main textual-ritual difference is at the Preparation of the Gifts, where the prayers and rites are very different (the prayers are a Didache and Proverbs inspired version). The Eucharistic Prayers also show certain variations from their final forms although they are largely the same. The 5th…