The Rite Decision
It's odd that people gripe when the Holy Father adds another possibility to our liturgical menu. We live in a society where choice and tolerance are the name of the game, yet objections appeared in the media about the Holy Father's decision even before he was able to promulgate his motu proprio on the use of the Roman missals. Pope Benedict XVI wisely published a letter with a directive that explained the motives for his action. As he states, "News reports and judgments made without sufficient information have created no little confusion. There have been very divergent reactions ranging from joyful acceptance to harsh opposition, about a plan whose contents were in reality unknown" (Benedict XVI, "Letter of his Holiness Benedict XVI to the Bishops," July 7, 2007, 1).
Many of the accusations were unfounded. But even post-publication, we hear a plethora of protests and a dearth of informed debate. The Holy Father's action is presumed to be a result of his "traditional" leanings, or part of a strategy to bring an obsolete language like Latin back, or an attack on the aggiornamento Vatican II brought us.
Common decency calls for giving anyone a fair hearing, particularly when that person shows good will, has deliberated long and carefully, participated in dialogue with others and prayed hard before taking action, as Benedict XVI has done. As Catholics, we owe more than common courtesy to the Holy Father, whom we believe is the Vicar of Christ on earth. We owe him loyalty and respect; we owe him an attempt to understand and appreciate his teaching. Going back to his writings, his interviews and his statements — both as Cardinal Ratzinger and as Benedict XVI — we can better appreciate his recent step in regards to the liturgy.
But before we go into the interviews and writings of Cardinal Ratzinger to draw out the reasons behind his steps taken regarding the liturgy, we need to clarify terms. In his motu proprio Pope Benedict XVI does not use the names "Tridentine Rite" and "Novus Ordo." Instead, he refers to two different Roman missals: one published by Blessed John XXIII in 1962, which contains the "Tridentine Mass," and the other promulgated by Paul VI in 1970, which contains the liturgy Roman Catholics are familiar with, called the Novus Ordo (New Order). They are not two different rites; "They are, in fact two usages of the one Roman rite" (Benedict XVI, Summorum Pontificum, 1). Given that they are different expressions of the same rite it seems they can be distinguished by the word "form"; the older is the extraordinary form and the more familiar, recent one is the ordinary form of the Eucharistic liturgy.
The decree opens the door for the use of another form of the Roman rite. It gives options for believers to find a way of worship that suits them. So why, when we live in a society that promotes options and freedom, have there been so many objections to the Holy Father's action?
"Back to the future": Is the Holy Father's action a step backwards?
Some have asserted that by permitting the extraordinary form of the liturgy to be celebrated more freely, the Holy Father wishes to go back in time. But a look at the life and person of Benedict XVI reveals that he is eminently realistic and lives facing the future. For instance, in a meeting with clergy from the Diocese of Belluno-Feltre on July 24, 2007, a priest asked the Holy Father if his personal hopes for the outcome of Vatican II had been misplaced — if Vatican II had been a failure. The Holy Father told him that we will see the fruits of the council, and explained the "growing pains" the Church had gone through to adapt to the council:
Growing always brings suffering because it means emerging from one stage and moving on to the next . . . in the concrete post-conciliar period there are two great historical caesurae . . . we had the pause in 1968, the beginning or "explosion" . . . of the great cultural crisis of the West . . . It was saying: "In two thousand years of Christianity, we have not created a better world. We must start again from zero in an entirely new way. Marxism seems to be the scientific recipe for creating a new world at last.". . . in the din of an anti-council sentiment and erroneous progressivism, the journey of the Church silently gathered momentum, with great suffering and great losses, as she built up a new cultural process. Then came the second phase in 1989 — the collapse of the Communist regimes; but the response was not a return to the faith as one might have expected. It was not the rediscovery that the Church herself, with the authentic council, had come up with the answer. The response instead was the total skepticism of so-called "post-modernity . . ."
It seems to me very important that our eyes are now open and can see all that is positive which developed in the period subsequent to the council: in the renewal of the liturgy, in the synods, the Roman synods, the universal synods, the diocesan synods, the parish structures, in collaboration, in the new responsibility of lay people, in the great intercultural and intercontinental co-responsibility, in a new experience of the Church's catholicity, of the unanimity that grows in humility and yet is the true hope of the world . . . I think we have to rediscover the council's great legacy.
These are not words of a man who lives in the past. They are words of a man who knows how the past affects the present, and how the present turns towards the future.
The claim that the motu proprio expresses a desire to step backwards comes from the erroneous idea that spiritual progress is like material progress. In material progress, time and effort discover and harness the laws of nature. Once one achievement is made, former achievements are obsolete. But the liturgy is not comparable. The extraordinary form of the Roman rite, the Tridentine Mass, is not an old car whose warrant of fitness has run out or an early version of Microsoft Windows that needs to be erased once the newer version is installed. As the Pope observes in article one of his motu proprio, this earlier form was never abolished. Its roots go far back into history. Spiritual progress doesn't follow the laws of invention, where time makes the old "out-of-date" and useless. Spiritual progress is deepening in the encounter with the Son of God who transcends time.
A profound reflection on the relationship of the Eucharistic liturgy to time can be found in Cardinal Ratzinger's book The Spirit of the Liturgy. There, he identifies three levels at work in Christian worship: the institution and foundation of the liturgy, the strictly liturgical, and the eschatological.
Both the strictly liturgical level and the eschatological level rely on the first level: the institution and foundation of the liturgy in the crucifixion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The paschal mystery is made up of "historical events that happen just once and as such belong to the past" (55). God truly did enter into time through the Incarnation of the Son of God. The events of his life, including his passion and death, belong within time; but unlike every other historical event, they are not relegated to an impenetrable past. A divine person is involved who is not limited by the bonds of time. These events are not fossilized remnants of faith; they are part of our lives and our liturgy. Christ's being, offered on the cross as an exterior act, was "accompanied by an interior act of self-giving (the Body is 'given for you')" (56), and this interior act transcends time because it was and is made by the person of Jesus Christ, who is God. "This liturgy is founded on the passion endured by a man who with his 'I' reaches into the mystery of the living God himself, by the man who is the Son" (57). Because this act goes beyond time but came at a specific moment in time, "time can again and again be brought into it. This is how we become contemporary with the past events of salvation" (56).
The third level of the liturgy, the eschatological dimension, is also rooted in the first. The Eucharistic liturgy should mark the everyday existence of the Christian because Christ's saving act is intended to transform hearts. "His self-giving is meant to become mine, so I become contemporary with the Pasch of Christ and assimilated into God" (58). So its action goes beyond the strictly liturgical moment. "Its aim . . . is that 'our bodies' (that is our bodily existence here on earth) become a 'living sacrifice,' united to the Sacrifice of Christ (cf. Rom 12:1)" (58). This means that our lives are united to Christ, made pleasing to God and united to him, now and in eternity.
There is still more to the third level of the liturgy. The transforming action of Christ is not limited to the deeds of individuals but reaches further: "The Sacrifice is only complete when the world has become the place of love . . . Only then is worship perfected and what happened at Golgotha completed" (58). And this level is called eschatological because, in the thought of Cardinal Ratzinger, "The 'today' of Christ lasts right to the end [of time]" (59).
The three levels incorporate past, present and future into a single act for all time, ever-present through the divine person of Jesus Christ, who exists outside of time. "The immediate event — the liturgy — makes sense and has a meaning in our lives only because it contains the other two dimensions. Past, present and future interpenetrate and touch upon eternity" (60). As Ratzinger says, the liturgy is a transforming encounter with the eternal God.
Liturgy, then, is not merely community prayer and a meal together. When we eat any other food, it becomes part of our body. But when we receive our Lord worthily in the Eucharist, we become part of Christ. We are assimilated and transformed into him, in his dying and his rising. We are given a taste of heaven. This is the essential action of liturgy. So liturgy, an act that touches eternity, cannot be outdated simply by the passage of time and changing fashions.
Someone might object here that the Second Vatican Council called for a change to the liturgy. To respond, it would be good to better understand exactly what the Council Fathers asked for. The key idea is actuosa participatio, "active participation." The Council Fathers said prevision should be made for the people to participate more actively in the Mass. In the older form of the Roman rite, many of the priest's prayers are inaudible and are in Latin. As a result, the faithful often prayed the rosary or some other prayer instead of participating in the liturgical action during the celebration of the Mass. It is certainly true that in the ordinary form of the Eucharistic liturgy, the Novus Ordo, we hear more and respond vocally much more than in the extraordinary form; lay people are more active in the liturgy. However, lay people can also participate actively in the extraordinary form of the Roman rite. To understand how, we turn to The Ratzinger Report:
The impression arose that there was only "active participation" when there was discernible external activity — speaking, singing, preaching, reading, shaking hands. It was forgotten that the council also included silence under actuosa participatio, for silence facilitates a really deep, personal participation, allowing us to listen inwardly to the Lord's word. Many liturgies now lack all trace of this silence (127).
It is clear from the then-cardinal's words that there is more to "active participation" than meets the eye — or the ear for that matter. But how can silence be a source of action? Perhaps our concept of action needs to be modified. The real "action" of the liturgy is, as Cardinal Ratzinger says in The Spirit of the Liturgy, "the action of God himself. This is what is new and distinctive about the Christian liturgy: God himself acts and does what is essential" (173).
The action — what "happens" in the Eucharistic celebration — is Jesus Christ, who is the Incarnate God, offered up as a sacrifice for our sake. This is the essential action. We actively participate in liturgy when we commit ourselves consciously to all three levels of the celebration: our realization of Christ's sacrifice, our presence in the liturgy and our commitment to meet Christ today in our lives.
Does this therefore leave lay people with anything "important" to do in the Mass? It depends on the definition of important. If importance means being in the limelight, then the answer is no. But if importance is living God's saving action, recognizing our God as he does the ineffable and lowers himself to take on the form of a piece of bread, and letting him transform us into himself, then the answer is yes. Anything valuable done by ourselves in the liturgy has to be in relation to Christ. He is the reference point, and we come to the liturgy seeking to be transformed into him.
Cardinal Ratzinger even claims that there is only one action in the Eucharistic liturgy, one that incorporates both Christ's action and our own. He says that the difference between Christ's action and our own in the liturgy is done away with because Christ unites both in him. We become "one body and one spirit" with him. "The uniqueness of the Eucharistic liturgy lies precisely in the fact that God himself is acting and that we are drawn into that action of God. Everything else is, therefore, secondary" (174).
This single action, with both divine and human dimensions, is the essential "action" of the Mass. Therefore, external activities in the Mass are secondary. This explains the Holy Father's concern about the liturgical abuses that abound today. Their emphasis on secondary elements leads people to lose sight of the essential action of the Mass.
If the liturgy degenerates into general activity, then we have radically misunderstood the "theodrama" of the liturgy and lapsed almost into parody. True liturgical education cannot consist in learning and experimenting with external activities. Instead one must be led toward the essential actio that makes the liturgy what it is, toward the transforming power of God, who wants, through what happens in the liturgy, to transform us and the world (175).
An impressive statement is made here. The future pope goes so far as to say that a Mass that has lost its focus on God and instead centers on external activity has become a satirical imitation, a parody. Once more, he underscores that God's action is essential, not our human activities.
This understanding of the nature of the liturgy casts light on how the Holy Father links the Tridentine form and the Novus Ordo together as a single rite. It would be easy to mistake the direction the priest faces, the audibility of the priest's words and the actions of the lay members for essential factors. But when we put the emphasis where it belongs, on Christ, other aspects become secondary. In both the ordinary and extraordinary forms of the Roman rite, the congregation is capable of participating actively by following along with their minds and hearts and praying fervently.
So far we have seen two main points: the Tridentine Mass is not outdated, at least by liturgical standards, and active participation of the people is possible in that form of the Roman rite. So its continued existence is not against the spirit of Vatican II. But, we could then ask, what does the Tridentine Mass have to offer to the majority of Catholics who prefer the Novus Ordo? Do we need to have liturgical options?
Adding to the liturgical menu? Or enriching our liturgical living?
The Holy Father's motu proprio permits us to discover anew the riches found within the Tridentine Mass and then in turn to bring out those same qualities in the Novus Ordo. Two aspects will be discussed here: the Tridentine Mass is wealthy in symbolism and in solemnity. Both of these are present in the Novus Ordo, but they have all too often been undervalued and lacking.
The Tridentine Mass is full of symbolic gestures. Symbols express more than mere words can; and when you're addressing God, whose nature is ineffable, that's something worthwhile. Since the Mass is a communication and communion with God who is invisible, symbolism plays a special role. Cardinal Ratzinger emphasized this in The Spirit of the Liturgy, saying that the theology of liturgy is a kind of theology of symbols, explaining that the role of symbols is to "connect us to what is present but hidden" (60).
To appreciate symbols further, let's consider two examples. Let's take the mutual gift of wedding rings between bride and groom as a symbol of their love. What makes it such a fitting symbol? Just as a person wouldn't carelessly leave gold lying around to be quickly stolen away, so a couple needs to carefully protect and nourish their love because of its value. Precious metals are also durable and take hard knocks without breaking. That's the same for married love, which has to bear up under all kinds of blows. Furthermore, its roundness symbolizes eternity and thus the unending love and fidelity of married love. All this is captured by a simple band.
Then there is the crucifix. People who knew nothing of the Christian faith would likely be appalled if they were to enter a Church and see a large cross with a man in agony hanging upon it. They might wonder if this religion were masochistic or macabre. But this crucified, tortured figure is the sign of God the Father's eternal love, of the fact that he didn't spare his only son, so that we could be saved. It's the symbol of mercy. When we look at it, we know that if Christ died such a terrible death for us, he will forgive any of our sins. It feeds our hope; we can reach heaven thanks to our Lord's loving sacrifice. It helps us to bear our suffering; if Jesus could suffer so much for me, being innocent, then I can also carry my cross. It affords deep consolation; Christ understands my misery and will never abandon me. It nourishes generosity; if he could surrender himself so completely for my sake, I want to answer back in kind. It awakens love; Jesus Christ is close to me as a person and is not a distant, unfeeling God. During the Holy Friday liturgy we kiss the cross in an act of reverence for this holy instrument of eternal life. All that and more is communicated through a man nailed to a cross. This symbol speaks to us.
Given the tremendous capacity for a symbol to convey important and profound meaning, it assumes an even more significant role in the liturgical action, through which Christ will be present Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. Words are not sufficient to express the awesomeness and sacredness of that moment, but symbols capture the yearning of the heart for God. Gestures of the priest speak of reverence, gratitude and hope in God. As he incenses the altar, a cloud of incense rising up heavenward is the symbol of our desire to rise in prayer to God. When the priest dips his fingers in the purificator as a symbol of his desire to be washed free of his sins, the whole assembly of the people prays to be cleansed of their own sins. When we learn the meanings behind gestures, we can accompany the movements and actions of the priest with our own silent fervent prayer.
It is possible for participants in the Mass to recognize and value the symbolic gestures found in both forms of the Eucharistic liturgy. Pope Benedict XVI himself unearthed the treasure of the liturgy throughout his youth. The following excerpt is taken from Salt of the Earth, Peter Seewald's interview with Cardinal Ratzinger. Ratzinger is answering the question: "As a young person, what did you find so fascinating about the faith?"
From the very beginning — it was exactly the same for my brother and sister, I think — I had a lot of interest in the liturgy. My parents had already bought me my fist missal when I was in the second grade. It was actually terribly exciting to penetrate into the mysterious world of the Latin liturgy and to find out what was actually happening, what it meant, what was being said. And so then we progressed by degrees from a children's missal to a more complete missal, to the complete version. That was a kind of voyage of discovery (49).
Were he and his brother and sister liturgical prodigies? It's more likely that their parents set them a good example and that others of the parish also followed the liturgy with a sincere fervent interest. A sense of wonder also helped in prodding him to penetrate the meaning behind what he witnessed.
And what about the solemnity in the Tridentine liturgy? The Tridentine form of the Roman rite is characterized by studied gesture, incense, purification, song and silence. This was seen as outdated and old-fashioned as a new view of liturgy came into vogue, with the lopsided tendency of portraying the Eucharistic celebration as a fraternal banquet, to the exclusion of anything else.
While it is true that the source of our brotherly and sisterly love stems from receiving the Eucharist, it would be churlish to down-play the role of the One who made our family ties possible. What was said earlier about the first level of the liturgy can be recalled here: above all, the Eucharistic celebration is a sacrifice, identical with Christ's immolation on the cross except that it is unbloody. The liturgy's sacrificial character calls for solemnity, a fitting manner to respond to Christ's supreme gift. Solemnity recognizes the seriousness and the great magnitude of Christ's self-abasement of dying and now remaining in our presence under the humble appearance of bread and wine. Joy, profound gratitude and a fervent hunger round off the divine interchange. All of these aspects contribute to the sacred character of the Eucharistic celebration.
A prerequisite for both solemnity and symbolism to take their proper place in the liturgy is that the priest follow the rubrics set down in the missal. Then there is a timelessness and sacredness to his actions, which transmit a meaning that goes beyond his individual personality. This holds true not only for the Tridentine Mass but also for the Novus Ordo. But it seems that deformations and arbitrary innovations to the liturgy flourished with the Novus Ordo. The Holy Father addresses the problem in his accompanying letter to the motu proprio of July 7, 2007:
In many places celebrations were not faithful to the prescriptions of the new missal, but the latter actually was understood as authorizing or even requiring creativity, which frequently led to deformations of the liturgy, which were hard to bear. I am speaking from experience, since I too lived through that period with all its hopes and its confusion. And I have seen how arbitrary deformations of the liturgy caused deep pain to individuals totally rooted in the faith of the Church (2).
If a priest's gestures only spring from his personality, they remain on a horizontal, human level. Though the priest be well meaning, the liturgy is thus impoverished.
Cardinal Ratzinger saw the need for something to be done. But neither then nor now was he thinking of turning back the clock: "What needs to be discovered in an entirely new way . . . is the 'given, non-arbitrary, constant and unshakable character of liturgical worship.'" In other words, he says, the signs, gestures and symbolism of the Mass need to be rediscovered with the fullness of their meaning, not reinvented.
Now, many years later as Pope Benedict, he simply wants to make the riches of the Tridentine Mass more accessible. In his accompanying letter he freely admits that he doesn't expect massive numbers of the faithful to choose this form of the liturgy on a regular basis: "The use of the old missal presupposes a certain degree of liturgical formation and some knowledge of the Latin language; neither of these is found very often" (2). It seems the Holy Father is being pretty realistic about the whole matter. No doubt he sees his action as a small step toward bringing his wide-ranging flock to a deeper appreciation of the liturgy. We ought to respond warmly to the invitation at the end of his July 7 letter: "Let us generously open our hearts and make room for everything that the faith itself allows" (3). Whether it be through the newer or older liturgical form, we should respond joyfully to the Holy Father's intention: that we focus on Jesus Christ and the centrality of his sacrifice on the cross as he reaches beyond the limitations of time to transform our hearts through the today of the liturgy and the today of our daily lives. It seems that this action of the Holy Father is his repetition of the words of St. Benedict, which he has chosen to summarize his pontifical mission: "Do not put anything before the love of Christ."
Works cited
Benedict XVI. "Letter of His Holiness Benedict XVI to the Bishops on the Occasion of the Publication of the Apostolic Letter Motu Propio Summorum Pontificum," July 7, 2007. www.vatican.va
Summorum Pontificum, July 7, 2007. www.vatican.va
Transcript: Meeting with Clergy of Diocese of Belluno-Feltre. July 24, 2007. www.vatican.va
The Spirit of the Liturgy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000.
Salt of the Earth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1997.
The Ratzinger Report. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1985.
Seewald, Peter. Una Mirada Cercana. Madrid: Ediciones Palabra, 2006.
Dr. Joan Kingsland is a native of Vancouver, Canada and a consecrated woman of Regnum Christi. She is currently a professor of theology at Mater Ecclesiae College in Greenville, Rhode Island. Her background includes an S. TD., S. TL and S. TB. from the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and the Family at the Lateran University in Rome. Prior to this she studied for her M.A. in liberal arts from the Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto and her B.A. in liberal arts from Thomas Aquinas College. This is her first article in HPR.
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