Abuse of the Extraordinary Form?

[Calum Cille]

The problem for me is that the language simply isn't strong enough. Those who wrote/write this stuff have had too much sympathy for the sullen regular non-singer.

A simple-minded thought. When God the Father is omnipresent we face him whichever way we face. As a 21st century Christian I derive little value in facing the rising sun despite neat puns, and little edification when someone turns their back on me.

Marana tha - come, our Lord - but don't expect us to be looking in the same direction as those who saw you go. So much for simple observations. We're cleverer than them and some of their ritual actions don't offer us much value or edification. How is it meaningful for us all to face the east today, even the priest? What do you mean, most of us do face the east when we pray?

Well, you know, I can appreciate that some people aren't as big on certain symbolism as others. But "as a 21st century Christian"? That's some banner waving, that. Shall I distance myself from any (potential, intentional or otherwise) implication that people who are big on such symbolism are behind the times and therefore backward? Or shall I indeed declare myself glad to be backward if an educated, artistic Christian of the 21st century can derive so little value from a ritual action related to the symbol of the dawn? Of all things to fail to derive much value from, a sun motif ... The education system has a lot to answer for.

Are you suggesting that 21st century people typically don't value ritual action connected to symbols? I must remind 21st century folks that it's not 'in type' to go down on their knees and pull out wedding rings. What difference does it make to a request whether you make it on your knees or not? What difference does a ring make? Don't both parties form the contract regardless of whether or not a ring is worn?

I'm hearing, "others may or may not derive value from it, but I'm raising the issue of the present day in an attempt to explain why facing the east has no value for me". It is almost as meaningful as saying, "As a builder, I don't see any value in wearing a poppy." What has being a builder got to do with it? What has the 21st century got to do with whether or not you find certain symbols valuable and meaningful or not and the fact that others do? On that argument, we should just shut up shop with the liturgy and go home - "it's the 21st century, so we typically don't value symbol-derived ritual action at mass."

Facing east represents something. Proposing on your knees represents something. A ring represents something. I would maintain that many people wouldn't be much moved by the consideration that facing west or proposing on one leg or wearing a wristwatch might be equally relevant to the respective realities. People generally (yes, even in the 21st century) value appropriate symbol-derived ritual actions, which is why (even though hope is relatively ubiquitous) candles are still lit all over the world as a symbol of hope rather than fairy lights. Since whether or not a candle is made of beeswax or paraffin has no physical bearing on the Body and Blood and Christ, it may be that you (as a 21st century Christian) derive little value from choosing one material rather than the other. However, I think social scientists might not take the little value you derive from such symbolism as being representative of general 21st century ritual instincts.

If you don't attribute much value to any given symbol-derived ritual action, it's not because you speak as a 21st century Christian, it's because (assuming you understand the symbolism) you don't appreciate it. I assume your main point is that you'd rather the priest faced a purportedly more edifying direction rather than the symbol that you, irrespective of our relative dates of birth, derive little value from. Moving on from the dodgy banner waving, perhaps one has to ask what exactly is supposed to be more edifying to the faithful about the average priest's front rather than his back while he prays to the Father. Is it the glint of real expectation in his eyes that his prayers will be duly answered? Or is it the heartening sight of a particularly shapely sign of the cross over the eucharistic elements? Much as I may appreciate ritual action, there is something slightly voyeuristic about focussing on every action of a single individual, even if you're there to help, learn or critique.

I find the symbolism of the east rich and enriching, not least in the context of ritual, and my own limited experience of the extraordinary form led to a personal opinion that facing the east is one of its strengths. One benefit of a priest turning his back on you is that it expresses very well that the Son's love and liturgical actions don't exist purely for you and certainly not for your entertainment (often oddly conflated with edification and actuosa participatio) but that both they and even you exist for the Father. The priest is not just there to serve and satisfy you. Facing the east, it seems much clearer that he has his own duties to get on with just as you have yours; he seems to carry more of the character of the lay faithful coming into mass to worship rather than to be wowed; he seems less of a stage presenter or performer who is there to make sure you enjoy watching the show. Facing east shows much better that God is the audience, not the lay faithful, and I'd say that the extraordinary form is even better than Orthodox liturgy at doing that. Facing the east has a potential benefit to the priest, who could be psychologically released to some degree from the eye to eye gaze of the congregation. Another benefit is that when the priest faces east, you can be certain that he's not talking to you but to God, and that's certainly an aid to many 21st century people in highly-literate cultures who find it harder to process or concentrate on the spoken word.

[nazard]

The problem for me is that the language simply isn't strong enough. Those who wrote/write this stuff have had too much sympathy for the sullen regular non-singer....

"Love one another as I have loved you" - that includes the sullen regular non singer.

Deus est caritas, et qui manet in caritate in Deo manet, et Deus in eo. Sit Deus in nobis et nos maneamus in ipso.

[Calum Cille]

"Love one another as I have loved you" - that includes the sullen regular non singer.

Deus est caritas, et qui manet in caritate in Deo manet, et Deus in eo. Sit Deus in nobis et nos maneamus in ipso.

I see the art of preaching is dead. So love is teaching Catholics that they don't have to come to mass, don't have to pray, and - don't have to sing with everyone else!?!? Don't they know that already? Real love isn't namby-pamby magisterial irresponsibility. Love is teaching Catholics that they should pray - and should sing that prayer - at mass because God deserves and desires it.

[Calum Cille]

... Be filled with the Spirit, addressing [λαλούντες] one another {with thankfulness [εν χάριτι]} [in] psalms and hymns and spiritual songs [ωδαίς], singing [άδοντες] and making melody [ψάλλοντες] to the Lord with all your heart [τη καρδία υμών], always and for everything giving thanks in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God the Father. Be subject to one another out of reverence for [εν φόβω] Christ.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teach and admonish [νουθετούντες: instructing, warning] one another in all wisdom, and sing [άδοντες] psalms and hymns and spiritual songs [ωδαίς] with thankfulness [εν χάριτι] in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

St Paul actually gives direct instruction to sing heartily in gratitude. What a different tone from the magisterial writers who more or less tell us that we are able to and that it's good to. "Well, thanks for that observation but I don't feel under any obligation and thanks for that too."

[nazard]

The issue here seems to be that you feel the church should state clearly that people must sing. I feel that to do so would be a failure of charity. Jesus himself was always as gentle as he could be with the majority of people. Consider how he handled the woman at Jacob's well, and the party who were about to stone an accused woman to death. He did not lay down the law, but brought them gently to the correct point of view. Contrast this with how he handled the pharisees and the traders in the temple. If we take the heavy handed approach with the reticent non singers, then we are putting them on a par with the pharisees. Now Jesus criticised the pharisees for making a lot of peripheral legislation surrounding religion. Were we to lay down firm rules about joining in the singing, would not we be treading in the footsteps of the pharisees? Let us be content with gentle persuasion.

I would suggest that the art of preaching is not dead, merely comatose. I do get to hear a good sermon occasionally.

You also pointed out St Paul on the subject of singing. I agree that there are those who ignore him. Look at Corinthians 11 3-15 for a widely ignored instruction.

[Calum Cille]

Consider how he handled the woman at Jacob's well, and the party who were about to stone an accused woman to death. He did not lay down the law, but brought them gently to the correct point of view.

Can you explain precisely how he brought the Samaritan woman to marry or estrange herself from the man she was living with? That isn't documented. And how did he prevent the (illegal) stoning except by issuing an instruction? This is beside the point: your examples don't relate to what Jesus expected of people in religious ceremony.

Scenario 1:
A: "You sure enjoyed the game on your mobile phone during mass, didn't you, Michael?"
B: "Yeah. I can see that you are a prophet." (Michael goes home.) "That man should be a cardinal."
Scenario 2:
A: "Michael, the choirmaster, actually swigs whisky during the eucharistic prayer. We all think someone else should conduct the choir."
B: "Don't you like Michael or something? It's not as if you lot have always been angels."
A: (Peeved looks and silence. Choir walks away.)
B: "Michael, looks like the problem's gone away. No one should be laying down the law over this kind of thing."

Contrast this with how he handled the pharisees and the traders in the temple. If we take the heavy handed approach with the reticent non singers, then we are putting them on a par with the pharisees.

I suppose ending the sale of indulgences was also heavy-handed. Nice sophistry: 'heavy-handed approach' is not a synonym for the words used by St Paul ('instructing' or 'warning') therefore instructing or warning people is not necessarily to treat them with a heavy hand as if they are a brood of vipers.

Were we to lay down firm rules about joining in the singing, would not we be treading in the footsteps of the pharisees?

So laying down rules about healthy people standing and kneeling at different points in the liturgy would also be "treading in the footsteps of the pharisees"? The comparison is a little stretched.

Let us be content with gentle persuasion.

Quite right, let's get rid of all instructions and imperatives in the church, especially with children. Our Lord never said "do this" or "don't do this" to his disciples; that would have been too confrontational and heavy-handed.

We'll just leave things to stroll along as they are and change nothing about the way we're doing this. We'll just need to make more of an effort at doing the same thing, that's all that's needed.

You also pointed out St Paul on the subject of singing. I agree that there are those who ignore him. Look at Corinthians 11 3-15 for a widely ignored instruction.

Thanks for the suggestion. I also find verse 2 very interesting. "I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you." Then there's verse 16. "If any one is disposed to be contentious, we recognize no other practice, nor do the churches of God." Since the weight of the evidence is that both men and women bared their heads in Greek pagan worship, my take on this is that St Paul is advocating that certain Christian customs (which may otherwise have had no practical advantage or disadvantage in liturgical terms but which were obviously culture-related and bearing some symbolic aspect) be observed despite local pagan religious practice being different. In other words, St Paul was promoting a common Christian culture in new Christian communities which cut across local pagan religious practice, and which was justified with recourse to Judeo-Christian, rather than pagan, symbolism but also to the customary difference in the length of men and women's hair in Greek culture.

[NorthernTenor]

I don't believe in a general return to the EF: after all a council decided to reform it.

But the Council didn't reform it - the Council asked for reform, and after the Council, the Consilium, influenced by a particular, contraversial understanding of reform, that would have been foreign to many involved in the liturgical movement earlier in the century, produced the new form; Paul VI authorised it; translators and Bishops' conferences added their own take; and clergy, liturgists and musicians implemented it. All largely by fiat, in a very ultramontane fashion. Which is why trads and the rest of us are where we are.

We've been here before, and this statement was as untrue then as it still is now. The Consilium, by and large, did its work in response to the demands of the world's bishops. All well documented. Read, for example, Piero Marini's A Challenging Reform[.

It is unrealistic to imagine that the vast international army of liturgical experts that were co-opted by the Consilium to carry out its work (once again, all well documented) would all have espoused the same "controvsersial" understanding of reform. On the contrary, they were scholars who had been part of the Liturgical Movement since the 1st World War and impassionately brought their skills and experience to bear on the task at hand.

We have indeed been here before, SC, and I’m sorry to say that your comments on these occasions illustrate the problem. Whenever it is suggested that the Mass of Paul VI and elements of its usage may not be entirely in continuity with Tradition and the liturgical documents of the Second Vatican Council, you reply that we should trust those responsible because they knew what they were doing. You reinforce this with reference to their writings, not so much as a stimulus to discussion (you seldom mention content in any detail), but more as an appeal to authority, as if no further argument is necessary. This is typical of that strange blend of ultramontanism and modernism that has plagued liturgical life these forty years and more, through the idea that it is the business of ecclesiastical authorities and their adjuncts to make the liturgy and its celebration more relevant and accessible, and our duty simply to trust and follow an avalanche of changes, detailed instructions and interpretations.

The problem with this is that the liturgy should not be a product of a particular time, or of the rational decisions of a generation’s hierarchy and their favoured liturgical scholars. It is “a constitutive element of the holy and living Tradition ... Even the supreme authority in the Church may not change the liturgy arbitrarily, but only in the obedience of faith and with religious respect for the mystery of the liturgy.” [Catechism, 1997, 1124-5] This speaks more of organic liturgical evolution over long periods of time than of the rapidly imposed discontinuities that followed the Council. It is also an approach that is in sympathy with Orthodox liturgical theology, whereas those responsible for translating the new liturgy in the English-speaking part of the world at least seemed to find themselves more at home with protestant liturgists.

The Catechism is a product of John Paul II’s papacy. His successor - a peritus at the Council - is in sympathy with its understanding of the liturgy, writing that “only respect for the liturgy’s fundamental unspontaneity and pre-existing identity can give us what we hope for: the feast in which the great reality comes to us that we ourselves do not manufacture, but receive as a gift.” [Spirit of the Liturgy, p168]. In doing so, he articulates the assumptions of key figures of the early liturgical movement, whose work focused on the nature and quality of our personal experience of a received liturgy, the authenticity of which lay in its gradual, untidy development over two millennia. Beauduin, for example, wrote that the “The Church of today is the Church of all times and of all peoples; hence her Liturgy is traditional. This characteristic is so important that it receives precedence over uniformity, as is seen in the preservation of the Oriental rites.” [Liturgy the Life of the Church, Farnborough, 2002, p. 34]. The earlier writers of the movement urged the removal of minor accretions and the restoration of some ancient practices, not the significant re-structuring of the late 20th Century. That substantial discontinuity reflected the culmination of the movement’s retreat from its foundational principles. Though even then, not all were happy with the direction reform had taken. Bouyer wrote: “Perhaps in no other area is there a greater distance (and even formal opposition) between what the Council worked out and what we have actually done ... I have the impression, and I am not alone, that those who took it upon themselves to apply the Council’s directives on this point have turned their backs deliberately on what Beauduin, Casel and Prius Parsch had set out to do” [The Decomposition of Catholicism, Franciscan Herald Press, 1969, p. 105].

We are where we are - a grave mistake has been institutionalised. However, The Church has overcome fundamental internal problems before. The best thing we can do in the parishes and as liturgical musicians is to forswear the scholastic interpretation of the latest detailed instructions, and strive instead to regain and cultivate that sense of a deeper, more generous tradition through our practice. Ritual, ad orientem celebration or the “Benedictine arrangement”, de-personalisation of clergy and others in their liturgical role, a more reverent reception of communion, singing the Propers, greater employment of chant - all these and other traditional measures, some of them commended to us by the Council, will help to heal the wound, and prepare us for the long term development and reconciliation of the two forms.

[Southern Comfort]

You see the postconciliar liturgical reforms, prepared for over the previous 60 years, as discontinuity. Others disagree with you.

I suggest, once again, that reading may help to provide a broader context. The first chapter of Keith Pecklers's recent book The Genius of the Roman Rite demonstrates beyond any shadow of doubt that what happened as a result of the Council was in complete conformity with the history of the Roman Rite over the best part of 2000 years. No discontinuity whatsoever. The Roman Rite has always adapted itself — reinvented itself, if you like — to the ambient culture. It's worth buying the book for that masterly chapter alone. The author is professor of liturgy at the Greg in Rome, and well respected as a scholar.

I think that the difficulty that some have with accepting the changes is due to the simple factor of timeframe. The postconciliar reforms happened extremely rapidly, after a 400-year period of what was mistakenly perceived as no change at all (in fact there were detail changes all the way along). It was like removing the lid from a pressure cooker, and in that respect it was very similar to the rapid collapse of Communism in the Iron Curtain countries. If it had all happened more gradually, some people would not have felt that the changes were so violent as to present the impression of rupture when in fact there was none.

[presbyter]

The Roman Rite has always adapted itself — reinvented itself, if you like — to the ambient culture.

Such as turning towards the rising sun and placing the celebration of Christ's birth on a sun feast.

[presbyter]

and strive instead to regain and cultivate that sense of a deeper, more generous tradition through our practice. Ritual, ad orientem celebration ......

But the "deeper, more generous tradition" of everyone facing the same direction to pray, for example, has nothing to do with facing the tabernacle - although I know several people who think that's what it is about. There's such a need for liturgical formation in both ordinary and extraordinary forms.

[Calum Cille]

I found it very useful for presbyter to raise the subject of the singing in certain masses in the extraordinary form: it allowed me to compare the state of affairs in the ordinary form. I certainly think it appropriate at this juncture to discuss specific reforms (whether applied, not applied or exceeded) and the meaning and worth of them in your own part of the world at least, with participants raising the various advantages and disadvantages of them.

"The reforms were bad." "No, they weren't, they were good." "Well, you say that, but lots of well-read people will disagree with you." "Well, lots of well-read people disagree with them. And what gives well-read people immunity from misjudgement?"

I have no dewy-eyed view of continuity. That went out of the window when tropes were banished. Doesn't reform (whether a specific single matter or a multitude of them) involve breaking with one practice and it ceasing, or another practice being either introduced or restored? Isn't a sense of continuity, or discontinuity, dependent either on overall amount of reforms and the reaction of the person using the word to that amount, or on the degree to which the reforms were or were not applied or were exceeded in practical application? Won't whether or not you think it's too much depend on your approval of the actual reforms themselves (whether in theory or practice) or your pastoral concern over the impact of them?

[JW]

Is it an abuse of the Extraordinary Form if the celebrant does not face east? My recollection is that both priest and people should face the same way - a symbol of all being at prayer towards God.

Whilst facing east has very rich symbolism and most churches do face east, I don't think it was compulsory! Side chapels, where Mass was often said if there were several priests in a monastery or parish do not face east in a church orientated to the east. I can think of main chapels, built in the Tridentine era, where the altar was not positioned to the east and so the celebrant was not facing east when celebrating Mass.

If it is an abuse, may I suggest that someone celebrating in the Extraordinary form bring a compass with them to check orientation, as a temporary altar may need to be set up on one side (or at the back) of the church. For example, and from memory, the main outdoor pilgrim chapel at Aylesford Priory probably faces east, but this means that all the indoor chapels, where Mass is more often celebrated, do not - so extraordinary form Masses there should always be celebrated outside (check the weather forecast before starting )

[nazard]

East has always been interpreted as facing the apse for the purpose of mass rubrics. Altars were always either against the wall or had a reredos, so if the priest stood on the wrong side he would have difficulty with many of the other rubrics.

[nazard]

Can you explain precisely how he brought the Samaritan woman to marry or estrange herself from the man she was living with? That isn't documented. And how did he prevent the (illegal) stoning except by issuing an instruction? This is beside the point: your examples don't relate to what Jesus expected of people in religious ceremony.

The point is that Jesus chose to ignore her lovelife except to mention that he knew about it. He felt it was more important to make her aware of the water which would quench her thirst for ever.

[Calum Cille]

Is it an abuse of the Extraordinary Form if the celebrant does not face east? My recollection is that both priest and people should face the same way - a symbol of all being at prayer towards God.

Whilst facing east has very rich symbolism and most churches do face east, I don't think it was compulsory!

It is an important point that many practices of a particular kind were not universal in application. However, the priest facing east was most certainly common practice, to the extent that, even in churches which faced west and in which the people faced west, the priest appears to have faced east and thus faced the people. To counterbalance the east-west question, I'd recall the fact that it was once far from compulsory in the tradition that the people should see what the priest is doing at the altar: for hundreds of years, we even experience curtains being closed blocking off the view of the altar at the most solemn moments of the liturgy (yes, in the west).

I wasn't suggesting that facing west is an abuse, however. The point I was making was that there was in many places an unnecessary (and some, with not a little justification, would say vandalistic) disconnection with an organic tradition which grown in strength down through the centuries. Our predecessors did not engage in the wholesale destruction of basilican churches because they considered it desirable (but not compulsory) for churches to face east, so why did those responsible for enacting the reforms of Vatican II want to destroy altars because Inter Oecumenici says it's better for them to be off the wall so that priests can walk round them and celebrate facing the people?

The general practice of the priest facing east is still seen as being ancient and theologically significant. We don't exist in a cultural vacuum. The priest facing east was the overwhelming norm prior to Vatican II, regardless of the orientation of the people or building. I just can't find a serious enough reason for the priest having to face the people all the time or walk round all sides of the altar if the altar isn't built that way. It's the Hermeneutics of Hierarchy show again, where very important elements of traditional thinking are seen as something to be wiped out for spurious gain on spurious argument in an era when many people think that everything in life, including church attendance, is about fulfilling their personal needs as a customer and compromising on nothing unless it helps you get what you want. God doesn't just sanction everything we want or give us it: one man in an east-facing church wishes the priest would face east to symbolising addressing God, the next wishes the priest would face west to the people so that it's more like an agape meal (but without re-introducing even the eulogia).

The prayers of the eucharist are not addressed to us. This direction of prayer is made most evident in a church facing east by a priest turning to face east when he says them. If there's no point in turning towards the sunrise to pray because God is understood today as being everywhere (and as if somehow they didn't believe that 2,000 year ago), then there's no point in getting up for mass at dawn at Christmas.

Having the priest face me all the way through mass adds no meaning to the mass. Having the priest turn away from me during mass towards the sunrise adds more meaning to the mass.