Monday 2 February 2015

''Summa Liturgica''...


Whether popes are good for the Sacred Liturgy?

Initially published on 24th June 2010, my modest imitation of the Angelic Doctor. Enjoy!

We proceed thus to the first article.

Objection I: It would seem that popes are good for the Sacred Liturgy. For as Peabody says: There are copious Indulgences attached to devoutly hanging onto the pope's every word, even if he proclaim the merits of the apostolic Sunday roast to be conducive to the salvation of souls (cf. Compendium of Cack, p.35). Furthermore, it is by no means the wont of the supreme pontiffs to make arbitrary and inconsistent changes with Tradition. Therefore, popes are good for the Sacred Liturgy.

Objection II: Further, just as the collective sentiments of every godly and orthodox soul exists in the will of the supreme pontiffs, so the will of the supreme pontiffs runs into the Sacred Liturgy. According to the Local Idiot: The public Ritus is whatever the pope says it is in any given time (cf. Studies in Collective Delusion, p87). In other words, whatever the supreme pontiffs hold to be truth, is truth. Moreover, since he who controls the present controls the past, popes have the authority to manipulate Tradition as they see fit (and bandage their mistakes up under the nebulous concept of the ''hermeneutic of continuity'' in the desperate hope that their shortcomings aren't noticed by posterity), and they can just as easily promote the liturgical books of 1962 as Traditional Liturgy, and in the spirit of submission to the ''magisterium'', expect all Christ's faithful to fall into line, even if the research (and often, the memories) of Christ's faithful into the objective history of the Sacred Liturgy indicates that the Ritus promoted by the supreme pontiff is by no means ''traditional'' but is itself the middle-stage in a well-planned and thoroughly successful reform of the Roman Rite. Therefore popes, as the supreme infallible authority on earth and the dispenser of God's Grace as a commodity, are good for the Sacred Liturgy.

Objection III. Furthermore, it is by no means the part of Christ's faithful to question the authority of the supreme pontiffs in matters of their craft. For popes, having the fullness of sacramental order as the supreme monarch high priest, superior to their vassal bishops, and more so than the mere laity, are endued with a special charism, knowledge and authority over the Sacred Liturgy. As Pumpernickel says: Let no man question the authority of the supreme pontiffs in matters pertaining to their exercise of Petrine authority over the sacred rites, even if the aforesaid authority makes a farce of Liturgy, for he shall be guilty of no small sin (cf. Ad Stupiditatis Amorem, Part II). Therefore, popes have the right, and have used that right, to change Tradition, and Christ's faithful have no right to complain when they do so.

On the contrary, Jesus Christ, yesterday, and to-day: and the same for ever (Hebrews 13:8). Moreover, church history shews that popes are ostensibly and invariably bad for the Sacred Liturgy.

I answer that the Ultramontane Papacy has committed greater violence to the Sacred Liturgy than any other force or would-be reformer in the entire history of the Church. Modern popes, that is to say from the Tridentine era even unto our own time, puffed up with the most deplorable arrogance about their own office and authority (epitomized by Pio Nono's infamous reply to Fr Guidi, who dared to question the pope's anti-evangelical understanding of Petrine inerrancy - la tradizione son’io), have not ceased to tamper with the liturgical tradition of the Church based on a certainly flawed and imbalanced hermeneutic of papal supremacy. In the aftermath of the Council of Trent, the task of implementing the liturgical reform was placed into the hands of the reigning pope - a self-evident deathblow to authentic Tradition and a round-about turn in the evangelical understanding of the faith and tradition delivered to the saints once for all (Jude 3), a rule from which liturgy is by no means exempt. One of the principle errors in the promulgation of the Missal of Pius V is shewn most clearly in the rubrics for low Mass, by which it was regularized when it ought to have been condemned as another liturgical abuse akin to the "dry masses" of mediaeval times Fortescue complains about. The latter history of the Sacred Liturgy in the Baroque period and beyond might have been very different.

In 1629 pope Urban VIII commissioned a small oligarchy of little Horaces to rewrite the antient hymns of the Breviary to better reflect the good grammar and classical metre of Horace et al, and to satisfy the absurdly pseudo-classical tastes of the 17th century, thereby spurning the profoundly beautiful hymnody of Ambrose and Prudentius, hallowed by constant use. The mutilation of the antient hymns of the Breviary under the auspices of Urban VIII is rightly held to be an huge mistake by all serious liturgical scholars. Battifol says that the reform ''deformed the works of Christian antiquity''; Fortescue says: ''No one who knows anything about the subject now doubts that the revision of Urban VIII was a ghastly mistake, for which there is not one single word of any kind to be said.''

In 1883 Leo XIII authorized the use of votive offices to lessen the burden of the lengthy ferial office, and while such an endeavour has at least intelligible motives (I am in sympathy here with busy parish priests who have many cares and commitments), such an authorization was misguided and obviously affronts the common Kalendar, which is expressive of the catholicity of the Latin rite in which the Church prays in unison. If there was to be any such ruling at all, it should have been "say as much as you can of the Office," or better still, "secular priests are dispensed altogether from the obligation of reciting the Office since there is not one synodal decree that mandates this abuse."

In 1911 Pius X administered his deathblow to the Roman Breviary with Divino Afflatu. His reform equalised the length of the Offices, but thereby breaking with the antient liturgical norms. Pius X radically altered the antient structure of the Psalter, most infamously with the Laudate psalms for Lauds. In 1913, by the command of Abhinc Duos Annos, Pius X further changed the precedence of octaves and a general revision of the Kalendar (the octaves of the Comites Christi are noteworthy points). How can all this be seen, therefore, as anything but a triumph of Ultramontanism? How is this Tradition? The opinions of liturgical scholars are equally damning of this reform. Robert Taft, SJ says: ''For anyone with a sense of the history of the office, this was a shocking departure from almost universal Christian Tradition.''

Arguably the final nail in the coffin of the remnants of traditional Liturgy was administered in 1939, when the College of Cardinals elected Eugenio Pacelli to the Papacy. Pacelli's involvement in the commission to revise and ''codify'' the sacred canons 20 years previously would, were I a Cardinal at the time, strongly indicate the obvious danger in electing him. In 1947 his most famous encyclical Mediator Dei was published, which, while being upheld by Michael Davies in his book Pope John's Council as ''the most perfect exposition of the nature of the liturgy which has ever been written,'' is profoundly untraditional in its content. So untraditional is it that it reverses the antient liturgical maxim: legem credendi statuat lex supplicandi. The encyclical goes on to say that the pope ''alone has the right to permit or establish any liturgical practice, to introduce or approve new rites, or to make any changes in them he considers necessary.'' Accordingly, in 1948 Pius XII commissioned yet another oligarchy of liturgists (under the supervision of the learned Annibale Bugnini) to make a thorough revision of the Sacred Liturgy.

Pius XII's reforms of the Sacred Liturgy were probably the greatest, most distressing and unprecedented in the entire history of the Church. The worst rebuke to him that ever was given to any man. The reforms are too great to give here a thorough exposition, indeed a man's life would not suffice for the telling of so long a tale of woe, but the decree Maxima Redemptionis of November 1955 completely restructured and mutilated the rites of Holy Week (which, with some devotional exception, were some of the most antient in the Roman Rite), with complete disregard for the rest of an ecumenical liturgical Tradition (the antient rites of Holy Week are much closer to the Byzantine rite in spirit and ethos than the corresponding rites of '62); all but three octaves (those of Christmass, Easter and Pentecost) were abolished, many Vigils also, the Kalendar was remodeled, some changes affected the rite of the Mass etc - all being disruptive of antient norms. I am sure that many of the subsequent reforms of Paul VI, by comparison (in my opinion) rather trivial, can be seen in a similar light.

In summary, modifications of the traditional rites of the Church by a centralized authority (the Papacy) have been questionable at best, deplorable at worst. It is the Christian East which has best preserved the correct approach to the Sacred Liturgy (often in spite of all odds, under the terror of the Sultan and the Communists), and have thereby preserved that spirit of the Liturgy, worshipping the Risen Lord in spirit and in truth. The Catholic Tradition is more solid than haply decisions of self-important popes, and it is a profound misuse of authority for popes to command Christ's faithful to accept a manufactured Liturgy in the name of obedience to the Apostolic See. The Church ought to thoroughly cultivate the antient Liturgy, but to what extent this means a centuries-long process, I do not know. For us now, living in a liturgical wilderness, this may not be that helpful. So, are popes historically good for the Sacred Liturgy? No they are not. Videat Deus et iudicet!

Reply to Objection I: Subsequent to the publication of his book, Peabody was imprisoned on charges of embezzlement, sodomy, fraud and corruption so he is not a reliable witness.

Reply to Objection II: The so-called hermeneutic of continuity is a fond fancy and well befits the current praxis of the Roman church. However, even a glance at the Word of God committed to us by the Church disproves this concept as a crude manipulation of historical theology and discipline.

Reply to Objection III. In the words of that pious lady Mrs Custom from John Taylor's Women Will Have Their Will or Give Christmass His Due: "God deliver me from such authority; it is a Worser Authority than my husband's, for though my husband beats me now and then, yet he gives my belly full and allows me money in my purse."

31 comments:

  1. Superb. Though the Angelic Doctor would have frowned. What choice is open to us then? Reprint pre-Trent books? What priest will ever be willing to celebrate according to them? And then, what about defunct local rites and the rites of religious orders? Excuse me if these questions have already received treatment. ALso, if i understand rightly, you are calling for a restauration of traditional liturgical theology- that dogmas receive their highest expression in the Liturgy.

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  2. What worries me is that you rather gloss over the question of whether you can be 'Catholic' whilst resisting the teaching authority of the papacy. Our Lord Himself gave Peter the authority to govern the Church, and to guide and shepherd the people of Christ : if you take away from the Petrine office the right to do this, then what have you left ?

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  3. What teaching authority is involved if a pope decides to move Corpus Christi or St. John the Baptist to the nearest Sunday and then, twenty-two days later, reverses the decision? If teaching authority is involved in such matters then serious questions arise as to its reliability.

    The effect of moving control of the liturgy from local authority to the centralised office of the Ultramontane papacy has been disastrous.

    As 'F.G.S.A.' indicates above there is a very strong need for the restoration of the absolute primacy of liturgical theology. Whether the decay has gone so deep in the West to be unrecoverable is another question.

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  4. Many thanks for your comments - it took all day to compose but it was worth it!

    Dominic Mary, undoubtedly part of the Petrine Ministry which is Christ-given is the ''teaching authority.'' However, I don't see that ''teaching'' necessarily entails radical revisions of the liturgical books, or commanding Christ's faithful (behind the pretence of this teaching authority) to accept novelty. Remember, it was the concern of the Fathers of the earliest Ecumenical Councils that they did NOT teach novelty. To the Fathers New = Heresy. And methinks that the New Rite, its older cousin the '62 Rite are precisely this - new. Moreover, the content of such Papal works as Mediator Dei contain much new teaching wholly alien to the ancient Liturgy.

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  5. F.G.S.A, there is of course no ''quick-fix'' solution to the problem, which is a problem that goes back centuries.

    For the time being I would suggest that priests use liturgical books prior to 1854 with the pre-Urban VIII Office hymnody. But I have no long-term plan which seems practical, and I doubt that most Traditionalists would accept it.

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  6. Have you read Liber de Sanguine et Corpore Domini of Lanfranc and the work of the same name of Paschasius Radbertus? I personnally haven't and would greatly like to. The first is available on google books. It would seem that these works propound the sacrificial reality of the Eucharist against the metaphorical interpretations of Berengar, Ratramnus,etc(the 'Negationists'- heretics are much 'Negationists'- negating Tradition). Now, Paschasius vindicated Transubstantiation on the authority of the Fathers, notably Ambrose. Keeping the spirit of the Fathers in all matters...

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  7. Pio Nono - "I am Tradition"
    Mediator Dei - "I am the Liturgy"
    Humani Generis - "I am the Fathers"

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  8. F.G.S.A, no I have never read anything by Lanfranc, although Belloc says he was a genius (knew Greek too, a rare achievement in those days). I am actually reading Durandus and George Orwell presently.

    Moretben, very succinct and very true.

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  9. However, if 'New = Heresy', then by corollary no development can ever take place, because it must involve some element of newness - which is the same as saying that the Church's teaching can never develop to meet the needs of the age . . . a doctrine of which I am, I fear, unconvinced.

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  10. DM

    What would these "needs" be? What does any age require, other than what was delivered once and for all? What do we need that isn't in Christ - the same yesterday, today and forever? It's not a rhetorical question - I'd be grateful if you could perhaps expand a little. I genuinely believe that this way of thinking, which seems to be taken absolutely for granted in "the West" is a colossal mistake.

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  11. Dominic Mary

    Here is Father Stephen - as uncannily apropos as ever:

    http://fatherstephen.wordpress.com/2010/06/25/tradition-and-the-heart/

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  12. Dominic Mary, the ''development of doctrine'' is a fond fancy, about which I might post soon enough. I have never in my whole life been able to understand the concept - at least as Newman expounded it. He might as well have said that essential Doctrine itself is mutable to meet the needs of the age, or certain circumstances. Why, if the Church is in dialogue with Jews or Muslims, not abandon belief in the Blessed Trinity for instance?

    I must agree with Moretben that there are no special needs to meet. The Church's Liturgy and Doctrine should remain constant and the same for all time. Always and everywhere.

    New = Heresy.

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  13. It has occurred to me that we may be watching an example of this in "real time"; I cannot be alone in having noticed a definite momentum building in response to the old liberal agenda for the relaxation of presbyteral celibacy. Pressure appears to be building in favour of establishing an ontological basis for priestly celibacy, flat contrary to scripture and tradition. Somebody or other gave a widely publicised lecture hinting at this at the Vatican recently, which was widely and favourably quoted by "conservative" RC priest-bloggers. Human nature being what it is, celibate clerics are unlikely to mount massive resistance to something that seems to raise their state to new levels of dignity.

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  14. Do you think the Apostles used whatever particular liturgy you idealize, Patricius? If not, then you too seem to approve of novelty. I am no friend of the current incarnation of the Mass, but it seems bizarre to suggest that all change is heresy. The very construction of churches constituted an innovation! Certainly, the saying of the Nicene Creed was unknown prior to the the Council. And so on . . . Tradition need not be static. There is a difference between legitimate evolution within an established framework and radical revolution, isn't there?

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  15. Welcome back, Patrick. I really do appreciate your reflections on the liturgy, though I no longer use the Roman rite (but Sarum in its place).

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  16. As a newcomer to this blog this is my first reading of the re-posted article, this Litany of Bad Papal Interference. Sympathetic as I am, I have to ask: if development of the liturgy lies with the bishop, what are the sound principles of Traditional liturgical development (derived maybe from the development of the Oriental rites, and the Roman rite in late antiquity), and what the Roman rite would look like if they had been applied. It can't be (or is it?) your belief that the liturgy is an unalterable given, to which no addition or revision is to be allowed by an arch-hierarch - such a view in itself would be very untraditional surely.

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    1. I do allow liturgical development but it has to be at the behest and under the patronage of a competent authority. The Papacy is demonstrably not that. Fortescue likes to lead us all to believe that the Roman Rite was "fossilized" after the Tridentine synod. That is a gross simplification of the period, which was marked by decadence, decline and decay. Apart from the realm of sacred music the only additions to liturgy from the late 16th century onward worth mentioning have been superstitious, devotional elements such as the incorporation of Benediction and the cult of reserved Sacrament into the liturgy for the Triduum; the rite of Benediction itself and the Forty Hours Prayer. Otherwise, the entire period is marked by a conspicuous, almost systematic neglect. The new Religious Orders of the Counter Reformation invariably eschewed liturgical rites; the Jesuits being the most notorious - but you can read Taft, himself a Jesuit and eminent liturgical scholar, for an interesting apologia for them in this respect. Strange as this may sound, I actually admire the Jesuits (possibly because I came from a Jesuit-run college).

      The principles of liturgical development should always be directed to how much can be preserved of the old and how much we are willing to work to do that. You may be surprised to learn that I called for a directive from Rome dispensing priests from the "obligation" of reciting Divine Office. The reason for that is that there are no synodical decrees that mandate private recitation (at least none of which I am aware or was aware at the time of writing this), and it is technically a liturgical abuse. Liturgy means public work and if liturgy is to endue Christ's faithful with any catholicity, holiness or scriptural principle it must surely be sung publicly. The resources required for a celebration of Mass are surely more than those required for a celebration of Terce before Sunday Mass? I would welcome and support any RC parish that decided to celebrate the Liturgy of the Hours on Sundays and Holydays.

      Unfortunately, we're flogging a dead horse. Private devotions and superstitious pieties have taken over what space the liturgy should have filled in the hearts of the vast majority of simple Roman Catholics. And what help are the Traddies in this respect? None whatsoever. On the contrary, the few times they organise any liturgy other than Mass it's invariably Vespers with Benediction added on and what of these ridiculous "rosary days of reparation," or whatever they're called? Novena prayers and chaplets. How does this help anyone?

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  17. What I've never understood, is why clerics in parishes with 3/4 priests don't pray the office in choir in the parish church every day, never mind holydays - if they have the obligation anyway.

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    1. Exactly. Even if they put on cassock and surplice and did a said service together it would be at least something.

      I once saw a priest reading out of what I presume was a Liturgia Horarum book on a tube train.

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  18. I live in a diocese of half a million Catholics, where the average parish of 10,000 members has three or four priests and a deacon or two. Not a single parish offers the public celebration of the divine office, not one! Five masses on a Sunday and two on Saturday night and throw in a few Spanish and Vietnamese masses, too. But no hours. Perpetual adoration, yes, and rosary novenas, but no hours.

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    1. Like I said, flogging a dead horse. If you proposed to any of them the idea of celebrating public hours the likelihood is you'd be greeted with scorn. Surely this means that something has gone terribly, horribly wrong?

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    2. Well, see, with the hours no one gets any stuff! You come to Mass, you get "the wafer"; you come to Ash Wednesday, you get a smudge of dirt on your forehead; you come to Palm Sunday, you get a flimsy palm frond; you come on St. Blaise Day, you get a candle showed in your face; you get an adoration chapel, you get time to read the diocesan newspaper!

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    3. And they can't even get the Imposition of Ashes right any more. The Ashes are supposed to be sprinkled over the head. The 'smudge' misses the point - and the mark - completely. I have even seen a stamp made of cork that is dipped into 'Ash paste' and imprints a Maltese cross on the recipients' foreheads. I suppose at least it was cork and not a potato... Everything reduced to minimalism.

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    4. Leaving a mark is also theologically questionable, viz. Christ's words about praying to the Father in secret.

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    5. Yes, I always thought it rather ironic that immediately after hearing Jesus's words, "anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by men," we sully our faces so that "the world knows we're Catholics," as we often hear in homilies.

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    6. I read an article in The Telegraph a few years ago in which the Bishop of Arundel and Brighton called upon his diocese to set reminders on their phones and set aside moments for prayer and penance at work or some other public place for the new Friday abstinence rules; the very same who said that these rules were a "mark of identity." I don't know about you but I can't think of a worse reason to fast!

      They have their reward, saith the LORD.

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  19. Evelyn Waugh and Mary Douglas (Natural Symbols) both speak of the unifying factors in communal fasting. Douglas points to the "Bog Irish" in England who lost their Catholic identity after the fasting regulations were lifted in the 1960s. Granted, if eating fish on Fridays is the only thing holding a faith-community together, I think there is a fundamental problem.

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    1. I do not question the benefits of communal fasting - fasting is an apostolic and good work - but any blessings one might otherwise gain from participating are surely obviated by it being done in public?

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    2. I was not arguing; I was bolstering the point you made, saying, "these rules were a 'mark of identity.'" I think my point can be found in the last sentence of my previous post.

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