NO TO THE BENEDICTINE ALTAR ARRANGEMENT AND YES TO 88% OF CATHOLICS NOT ATTENDING MASS

Praytell is reporting something Sandro Magister wrote in his blog and I copy it directly:

Sandro Magister writes today in L’Espresso that Pope Francis’ revolution in the Roman curia continues to chop off some heads.

As Pray Tell reported, Fr. Corrado Maggioni, SMM has been named undersecretary (third in command) at the Congregation for Divine Worship. He is 58. With his appointment, Fr. Anthony Ward , SM (66) and the Spaniard Juan-Miguel Ferrer Grenesche (53) lose their jobs.

Magister sees the removal of Ferrer, whom Benedict XVI had appointed in 2009, as significant. Benedict brought him from Toledo, Spain, where was had been vicar general for Cardinal Cañizares Llovera, whom Francis recently removed as prefect of the CDW without yet naming a successor.

Magister notes Ferrer’s respect for tradition, especially in the field of music and Gregorian chant.
Anthony Ward is known for his close work with Msgr. James Moroney, executive secretary of Vox Clara, in the production of the new English missal. Some have wondered whether Ward had a hand in the writing of Liturgiam authenticam, the 2003 Vatican document on liturgical translations, although other names have also been mentioned in that regard.

Magister reports that the new undersecretary has liturgical sensitivities close to those of the former papal MC Piero Marini. Marini worked under Annibale Bugnini in carrying out the liturgical reforms called for by the Second Vatican Council.

In “Encountering Christ in the Liturgy,” Maggioni gives a solid, mainstream understanding of the liturgical reform. He gets exactly right the importance of interior participation before external participation. And he says this about the “truth of signs”:

There comes to light also the importance of the “truth” of signs: the altar, a sign of Christ, cannot be transformed into somewhere to put things, as if it were a shelf, nor can the sanctuary, where the priest acts “in persona Christi” be mistaken for a stage, nor can the baptismal font be reduced to a basin and jug, nor the gift of the white robe be minimised by placing on the newly baptised person a small piece of material which cannot be worn, nor can the paschal candle, sign of Christ risen and living forever, be a tube of plastic which never burns down while it shines, brighter than “the morning star”…

My comments: Everyone knows I don't like to get into the ideological politics of things, but I would like to comment on Maggioni paragraph quoted above.

What is there not to like in that paragraph? In fact, I like Catholic Churches to look like Catholic Churches and not Protestant meeting spaces with a stage for whatever it is they do on that stage.

I like real Easter Candles that actually are consumed and hate the artificial metal or plastic ones we see in so many places and even close to St. Joseph Church.

I like Catholic altars that look like an altar of sacrifice and not some kind of news desk in a high tech television studio. And I like the focus on the altar with cross and candles sticks on the same and not spread out over the floor in different locations calling attention to their useless selves in that position other than on the altar.

I like baptismal garments to look like garment not stoles or something smaller.

But most of all I like vibrant Catholic parishes which have 88% of Catholics going to Mass every Sunday and there are plenty of priestly vocations as opposed to the modern experience based where the liturgical niceties that Maggioni writes about are in abundance but only 12% of Catholic attend Mass and there are no vocations!