Life begins at 40? A historical perspective of liturgical reforms in recent times and a look to the future From The Amen Corner, January 2003, Worship. Used with permission. By Nathan D. Mitchell
December 2003 marked the fortieth birthday of Sacrosanctum Concilium (SC), Vatican II’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy. In the intervening 40 years the liturgical outlook seems to have eroded from quiet confidence to bleak pessimism. From the Council’s vision of worship that is full, conscious, active, and participative—a liturgy that is simultaneously intelligible and suffused by the very Mystery it seeks to worship, a liturgy that welcomes “variations and adaptations to different groups, regions, and people”—to the regressive strictures of Liturgiam authenticam. What happened? First, what’s worked and what hasn’t? Long story short: Over the past forty years, Catholic worship in American parishes has been utterly transformed. Despite persistent agitation in some quarters for its return, Latin has all but disappeared, replaced by vernaculars. Silent Masses on Sunday are virtually unknown: our people sing (if not always well or enthusiastically). A new and vastly improved (if still imperfect) lectionary offers people far richer fare from the “table of God’s Word.” Scripture-based homilies are heard at most Masses, even on weekdays. (These homilies are not always inspired or memorable, but many Catholics would agree that preaching in parishes has improved since 1963.) Important sacraments and rites keyed to the human life cycle—from the baptism of children to burial of the dead—are celebrated in symbols, gestures, songs, and words that people can see, hear, understand, remember, and respond to. At Sunday Mass, almost the entire assembly receives communion, usually in both kinds (a practice that the new “Norms for Communion” approved for the United States in April of 2002, seek to expand and strengthen). Anointing the sick has become just that—and not “extreme unction” or the dreaded “last rites.” In sum, after centuries of disenfranchisement, lay Catholics have once more reclaimed a direct role in worship—as full-fledged participants and/or ministers (e.g. readers, singers, cantors, instrumentalists, acolytes, ministers of hospitality, eucharistic ministers). Ironically, it was during the early 1980s, just as liturgical renewal in the United States seemed to be moving into high gear that a “period of increasing caution, restriction, and retrenchment” began to unfold. This period was brought on, in part, by official Roman responses to traditionalists who sought a return to preconciliar (Latin, Tridentine) forms of worship. Rome’s policy of appeasing traditionalists certainly did not repeal Vatican II’s reforms, but it did embolden those who had resisted the postconciliar liturgy from the get-go. The upshot has been increasing restriction on the role of lay liturgical ministers, on inclusivity in English translations, on the type and extent of cultural adaptation, on church art and architecture (e.g., the placement of the tabernacle and arrangements in the sanctuary), and, most recently, on the use of sacramental forms approved after Vatican II (e.g., Rite Three of the sacrament of reconciliation, which allows general absolution under certain circumstances). So—does life really begin at 40, or has SC been eclipsed and sent into early retirement? In my judgment, it is accurate to say the conciliar reform is being “renegotiated.” Western liturgical history demonstrates that what inevitably follows reform is renegotiation. This was so in seventh-century Rome. The same phenomenon happened in the ninth century, the late eleventh century, and during the sixteenth century. And it is happening again in our own time, today. There are, of course, some differences. Several neuralgic issues have combined to produce what the media call “liturgy wars” in the United States. In my view, much of this warfare focuses not on real issues, but on “shibboleths,” familiar formulas, ideas, or slogans used as litmus tests to divide “traditionalists” from “fuzzy, laissez-faire liberals.” There are four such shibboleths driving today’s “liturgy wars.” The first shibboleth centers around the phrase “preserving the substantial unity of the Roman rite.” To comment, the Roman rite is an historical amalgam, a mosaic, a smorgasbord. Its unity derives more from duration than from content. The Roman rite is not a single set of authoritative texts or a style of music but a cultural process—a ritual process—that has continued uninterruptedly for two millennia. The second shibboleth is the affirmation that the ordained priesthood “differs in essence and not merely in degree from the baptized priesthood of the laity.” The issue here, or course, is hierarchy. But the Church subverts the secular structure of hierarchy and obedience; the bosses are those who obey the people’s hunger for God and holiness. The third shibboleth is the phrase “real presence” as applied uniquely to the consecrated gifts of bread and wine at Mass. This ancient belief is adhered to by all, still. The issue is the Council called us to refine, enrich and contextualize our understanding of the Eucharist’s real presence by placing it in relation to the many presences of Christ. Hence we come to understand that the One who is present on our table as sacred food and drink is the very same One who is gathered at the table as holy people, celebrating assembly, Body of Christ. The fourth and final shibboleth is the notion that there is a “distinctively Catholic” art and architecture which is visible and peculiarly “sacred” and hence appropriate to the liturgy. The “sacred” is not a quality that inheres in objects; it is not a thing, but a relationship, an encounter initiated by the Holy for the sake of bringing us into relation with itself. Art is born of that relationship—and hence sacred art can be any human activity brought to life by God. In sum, when it comes to Vatican II’s vision of liturgical renewal, perhaps life really does begin at forty. Notice that I say “life,” not some romantic fantasy we young “rebels” dreamed of in the 1960’s. The supremely good news is that after centuries of disenfranchisement, lay Catholics have reclaimed a direct role in worship. Finding fault with “the way things are being done today” is not, of course, difficult to do…. Every period of liturgical history—without exception—has its share of “horror stories.” Indeed imperfection might well be reckoned as one of liturgy’s great glories, for it reminds us that the command to “worship God” is, finally, impossible, that we always approach the task halting and limping, on the lam, villains and fugitives, sinners all. We keep returning to the Sunday liturgy because, quite simply, we never “get it right.” Ours must always be the prayer of the publican, “Lord, be merciful to us sinners!”