The Spirit of the Liturgy

Una Voce ^ | November 17, 2002 | Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

[ultima ratio]

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Contact Excerpt from Cardinal Ratzinger's The Sprit of the Liturgy Rites are not rigidly fenced off from each other. There is exchange and cross-fertilization between them. The clearest example is in the case of the two great focal points of ritual development: Byzantium and Rome. In their present form, most of the Eastern rites are very strongly marked by Byzantine influences. For its part, Rome has increasingly united the different rites of the West in the universal Roman rite. While Byzantium gave a large part of the Slavic world its special form of divine worship, Rome left its liturgical imprint on the Germanic and Latin peoples and on a part of the Slavs.

In the first millennium there was still liturgical exchange between East and West. Then, of course, the rites hardened into their definitive forms, which allowed hardly any cross-fertilization. What is important is that the great forms of rite embrace many cultures. They not only incorporate the diachronic aspect, but also create communion among different cultures and languages. They elude control by any individual, local community, or regional Church. Unspontaneity is of their essence. In these rites I discover that something is approaching me here that I did not produce myself, that I am entering into something greater than myself, which ultimately derives from divine revelation. That is why the Christian East calls the liturgy the "Divine Liturgy", expressing thereby the liturgy's independence from human control.

The West, by contrast, has felt ever more strongly the historical element, which is why Jungmann tried to sum up the Western view in the phrase "the liturgy that has come to be". He wanted to show that this coming-to-be still goes on — as an organic growth, not as a specially contrived production. The liturgy can be compared, therefore, not to a piece of technical equipment, something manufactured, but to a plant, something organic that grows and whose laws of growth determine the possibilities of further development.

In the West there was, of course, another factor. With his Petrine authority, the pope more and more clearly took over responsibility for liturgical legislation, thus providing a juridical authority for the continuing formation of the liturgy. The more vigorously the primacy was displayed, the more the question came up about the extent and limits of this authority, which, of course, as such had never been considered. After the Second Vatican Council, the impression arose that the pope really could do anything in liturgical matters, especially if he were acting on the mandate of an ecumenical council. Eventually, the idea of the givenness of the liturgy, the fact that one cannot do with it what one will, faded from the public consciousness of the West.

In fact, the First Vatican Council had in no way defined the pope as an absolute monarch. On the contrary, it presented him as the guarantor of obedience to the revealed Word. The pope's authority is bound to the Tradition of faith, and that also applies to the liturgy. It is not "manufactured" by the authorities. Even the pope can only be a humble servant of its lawful development and abiding integrity and identity. Here again, as with the questions of icons and sacred music, we come up against the special path trod by the West as opposed to the East. And here again is it true that this special path, which finds space for freedom and historical development, must not be condemned wholesale. However, it would lead to the breaking up of the foundations of Christian identity if the fundamental intuitions of the East, which are the fundamental intuitions of the early Church, were abandoned. The authority of the pope is not unlimited; it is at the service of Sacred Tradition. Still less is any kind of general "freedom" of manufacture, degenerating into spontaneous improvisation, compatible with the essence of faith and liturgy. The greatness of the liturgy depends — we shall have to repeat this frequently — on its unspontaneity (Unbeliebigkeit).

Let us ask the question again: "What does 'rite' mean in the context of Christian liturgy?" The answer is: "It is the expression, that has become form, of ecclesiality and of the Church's identity as a historically transcendent communion of liturgical prayer and action." Rite makes concrete the liturgy's bond with that living subject which is the Church, who for her part is characterized by adherence to the form of faith that has developed in the apostolic Tradition. This bond with the subject that is the Church allows for different patterns of liturgy and includes living development, but it equally excludes spontaneous improvisation. This applies to the individual and the community, to the hierarchy and the laity. Because of the historical character of God's action, the "Divine Liturgy" (as they call it in the East) has been fashioned, in a way similar to Scripture, by human beings and their capacities. But it contains an essential exposition of the biblical legacy that goes beyond the limits of the individual rites, and thus it shares in the authority of the Church's faith in its fundamental form. The authority of the liturgy can certainly be compared to that of the great confessions of faith of the early Church. Like these, it developed under the guidance of the Holy Spirit (cf. Jn 16:13).

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Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, The Spirit of the Liturgy (Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2000), pp. 164-167).

Posted 17 November 2002/sl

[ultima ratio]

You ask what bothers me about this break with tradition. I will tell you. Modernism rejects the Church's own past from the time of Constantine. It seeks to "update" the faith by doing so, and introduces innovations which undermine traditional beliefs. For instance they suppress the doctrine of the Real Presence by never mentioning it or fostering an agenda to correct widespread disbelief among Catholics regarding this doctrine.

What's wrong with this? Plenty. If the past 1500years was mistaken, if the Church took a wrong turn in the fifth century, despite all the evidence of subsequent councils and popes, then nothing was true. It was all just a lie or a self-deception. And if this was the case then--how can it not also be the case now? Catholicism itself collapses.

This is because Modernists can't have it both ways. They can't say, oops! we got it wrong for 1500 years but now we've turned the corner and finally have got the hang of it--which is what they are trying to say. They make high-sounding claims to having now been inspired by the Holy Spirit--but nothing they have done has born any fruit and, in fact, the opposite has happened, whatever they have touched has turned to corruption. So why should we believe such false prophets when they tell us the past was wrong but now we are right?

[Desdemona]

While some of us have some sympathy with your arguments regarding worship and liturgical forms and norms, name calling does nothing to help your cause in the matter of Catechism and Papal office infallibilty.

Knock it off.

[Desdemona]

They make high-sounding claims to having now been inspired by the Holy Spirit--but nothing they have done has born any fruit and, in fact, the opposite has happened, whatever they have touched has turned to corruption. So why should we believe such false prophets when they tell us the past was wrong but now we are right?

I do have some sympathy with the sentiment. Oddly enough, my mother was extolling the simplicity of the new configuration in her parish and she said, "Oh, Desdemona, you'll love it. It's so simple." And I came back with, when is it going to sink in that I LIKE ornate churches and statues and votive candles. Although, the only thing they really took out was the Communion Rail (it DID look like rink dasher boards).

I have wondered why tradition was so blythely tossed aside and when I've asked, I usually do get a non-answer. But these are people who pitch "junk" as a sport. Overall, history itself isn't really valued, nor is tradition. ultima, it's not just the church. Everything is based around convenience and ease. Well, God and His church aren't convenient and living the faith certainly isn't easy. And by throwing away the old ways, some very short sighted people did some major long term damage. I'll definitely go along with that.

Frankly, when people with great gifts who offer them freely are refused merely because of a whim you do have to wonder at motive. There's far more focus on self and individual sprituality than being one part of the whole. And that's the larger culture interfering.

[ultima ratio]

No, it's not a matter of aesthetics or attentions spans, believe me. The pre-conciliar popes warned this was coming. That was why the clergy were required to take an oath to oppose modernism prior to being ordained. That was why Pius XII wrote Mediator Dei. These people were there waiting for their opening and had every intention of changing Traditional belief when they finally got their chance. It was deliberate. What they want to impose is a new religion. They are meeting unexpected resistance from the traditionalist movement--but they haven't given up and they have the Pope on their side. Think of the audacity of what they are doing: they are substituting Protestant theological principles for Catholic, but hide behind papal authority to impose this. This is despicable because it puts the faithful on the horns of a dilemma: either we choose the age-old faith and side against the Pope, or we go along with the new religion and stick with the Pope.

[ultima ratio]

Why pick on Bud? Have you read the scurrilous stuff oozing out of Catholicguy?

[ultima ratio]

Ha! Bravo!

[Desdemona]

Have you read the scurrilous stuff oozing out of Catholicguy?

Yes, and he is getting carried away, but you guys need to understand that the constant harping on the pope (and Vatican II, for that matter), even when he does do questionable things, is just not our brand of Catholicism.

You guys have some very good serious points to make, but attacking the pope while making them turns people off.

[Desdemona]

Maybe the better question for you is WHY?

Why are they trying to bring down the church?

Why are they trying to invent a new religion?

And why do they assume people are so stupid that they won't see it? (I actually know the answer to this one)

[RobbyS]

You are really hung up on this Koran thing, aren't you? Anyway, your insistence on the differences between the new form of the mass and the old forms ignores how much they have in common and confuses the role played by mistranslation and misuse by liturgical zealots who were/ARE hostile to the old forms or even the doctrines behind them. Most of this has been done at the local level, where the zealots seized control and many remain in power.

[Desdemona]

confuses the role played by mistranslation and misuse by liturgical zealots who were/ARE hostile to the old forms

...because it doesn't allow "liturgists" (theater producers with no responsibilty) to be creative enough. They don't know enough dogma to know what they're doing half the time.

[WriteOn]

I didn't err. I explained the process by which doctrine is developed.

You can't possibly be claiming the Tridentine mass leaped into existence as a divinely ordained whole! Lol. The idea the liturgy hasn't been developed by the same process as doctrine is ridiculous. Your accepted the idea the liturgy evolves organically, but you can't explain the process. I am telling you the process is dialectical. Refute if you can.

Your statement that the Novus Ordo mass, doesn't have an offertory, consecration and communion is patently ignorant. You'll have to explain. Since it does, your argument that it disregards ancient structures is invalid. What fundamental Catholic doctrine is ignored that is intrinsic to the Mass?

[RobbyS]

They could not get away with such mischief without the consent of the ordinary, except that the religious orders do have a large measure of independence.

[ultima ratio]

Read what I said again. The dialectic is a process that has nothing to do with liturgical development and very little to do with doctrinal development which begins and ends with revelation. My point was not that the Novus Ordo Mass has no Consecration or Communion--it does. What it does not have is the tri-partite sacrificial structure. This is because it has eliminated the Offertory, substituting for it the Judaic prayer of thanksgiving recited at meals. It thus deliberately converts the Sacrificial character of the Mass to a Memorial Meal--something Trent has explicitly condemned.

[Desdemona]

This is because it has eliminated the Offertory, substituting for it the Judaic prayer of thanksgiving recited at meals.

For those of us who are ignorant souls, explain please.

[ultima ratio]

Sorry if criticizing the Pope turns some of you off, but there is no other way to make these points. It is the Pope above all who stands in the way of reform and a return to the true Catholic faith. He alone has the authority to knock heads together and exert some discipline over belief and practice. He will not do this but instead presides over the wreckage of Tradition.

[ultima ratio]

Here is my take on why: because the truths of the faith do not tally with liberal assumptions about the way the world works. Virgin births don't happen, therefore the Gospel account is mythical. Ditto the Real Presence, the Resurrection, the Divinity of Christ--doctrines which test the boundaries of faith by asking for our childlike credulity and assent. This is offensive to such sophisticates who buy into historical criticism as a method to explain away such dogmas. Far easier for them to reduce the miracles of faith to mere symbols and myths. In a nutshell: modernists want to justify their own blameworthy deficiency of faith by reducing what Catholics believe to a form of natural humanism. Christ warned about this. He said we had to be childlike in the way we believed, something modernists cannot be.

[Desdemona]

Here is my take on why: because the truths of the faith do not tally with liberal assumptions about the way the world works.

A power-struggle had nothing to do with it? Just over-education and a tendency to need to see to believe?