There is a somewhat good and scholarly article on Vatican II's call for "active/actual" participation in the Mass. You can read it HERE.
But, for many progressive liturgists, especially those who post at Praytell, active participation in a very narrow sense is a false god. Yes, yes, I know that I am judging, but judge we must!
A more expansive understanding of Active Participation in either form of the two forms of the One Latin Rite is certainly needed.
1. Prior to Vatican II, one of the most important aspects of active participation took place and on a massive, massive basis: the vast majority of Catholics went to Mass on Sunday! Active participation cannot take place without bodily presence. In this country up until about 1965, over 90% of Catholics attended Mass. Just prior to the pandemic, in some places, once the Lexus of Catholics' real presence at Mass, the northeast in general, less than 12% of Catholic attend Mass. By any standard this is a post Vatican II colossal failure of active participation.
2. Active participation thus has three aspects, physical presence, spiritual presence (internal participation) and external participation where the person strives to speak and sing those parts that pertain to him. Of these three, the two more important are physical and spiritual presence! Verbal presence is nice, but the least important of the three. Thus from most important to least it is: A. Physical Presence; B. Spiritual presence and finally C. verbal participation.
Those who scream about Catholics who, while present, sit as bumps on a log, singing or saying nothing, and perhaps, daydreaming, or worse, praying the Rosary with Rosary Beads in hand, are not actively participating are truly the judgemental ones in the Church today and to be decried.
What about the blind and deaf person who goes to daily and Sunday Mass? Is there no active participation? What about the Spanish speaking person who goes every Sunday to an English or Latin Mass? Is there not active participation?
Thus, to conclude and in clear contrast to the Praytell article, this is what active participation is:
1. Physical presence
2. All the senses are touched, sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing.
3. The sixth sense, the supernatural, the Holy, the Mystery and Mysticism is touched too within the soul by God's initiative and sanctifying Grace, His Real Presence!
But what if a person, can't see, can't hear, can't feel, can't speak, can't smell and can't taste? But they are truly present each Sunday. Can God enact true active/actual participation in such a person? YES!
And yes, a person who is shut-in or home bound and religiously "watches" a live-stream Mass from their home parish and simply watches but prayerfully--that is active participation too!
Both EF adherents and OF adherents truly need to expand their own ideologies concerning "actual/active" participation and name the Source for it. That Source is God and God's initiative of Grace in a person's life.
3 comments:
Excellent post. Do you think the Council Fathers when voting on Sacrosanctum Concilium even considered that the "reforms" might result in less active participation since the result was the emptying of Churches? You cannot change the worship patterns of centuries without some negative fall-out. One of my parish priests in 1965 told me when I came to serve Mass, that the reforms were too much, too fast. At least one member of the clergy got it.
Granted, the reforms probably were “too much, too soon” but the Bishops of the world still assembled in session knew it was now or never to implement the backlog of 500 years of much needed and overdue reforms, and if they waited until after the Council had concluded that the Curia would obstruct their rightful aspirations. If you want to place blame for what happened then blame the Sacred Congregation of Rites who rushed through premature and ill thought thought changes in an attempt to preempt the Concillium.
Liturgical “scholat”
LOL - you are invested in the last 50 years of failure, we get it. The “reforms” were neither asked for nor desired by the faithful, just leftwing clerics who had Mommy and Daddy issues
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