Prior to the return of the Vetus Ordo, even in a limited way around 1986, for the majority of thinking Catholics, the liturgy wars did not revolve around the old verse the new Mass. It revolved around the proper celebration of the new Mass compared to the abusive ways the new Mass was being celebrated not only by priests but various communities including religious orders.
Those who wanted a free-wheeling liturgy with creativity on the spot, the celebrant-focused Mass, and making things up as he goes and, for some weird purpose still unknown to me, giant puppets used at Mass, they accused those who were waging war on all of that as being liturgical Nazis.
For them, the problem was that anyone would call them out, especially the liturgically rigid.
And it wasn’t just puppets that war waged upon, but unnecessary numbers of extraordinary ministers of communion, making them ordinary. It was also on the use of the common chalice for huge numbers of communicants which, in fact, is against liturgical law in the GIRM.
But this war was also on poor music, normally contemporary Broadway sounding ditties set to religous words. But also instrumentation that excluded the organ which was suppose to have a pride of place at Mass, along with Gregorian Chant, Latin and reverence. The old liturgy wars was about the loss of all of these, including reverence.
It was a war on sloppiness too and on wreckovations.
There is a lot more too. But with Summorum Pontificum and then Custodis Traditionis, a war to crush SP, the liturgy wars have shifted to not having the Vetus Ordo celebrated on an equal footing with the Novus Ordo. In fact, the war from the Vatican on the Vetus Ordo also included the nuclear option of not even being able to advertise the Vetus Ordo in parish bulletins and this mandated not from the local bishop but from Rome! That’s what Orwellianism is, no?
6 comments:
Indeed! But not only did it promote the abuses (I use the term advisedly) you mention but also included the suppression of legitimate options in the new Mass to celebrate in a manner that was consistent and a continuation of our liturgical history. It was, in fact, this liturgical war that created the renewed desire for the old Mass. If not for this, a calm traditional (pace, Fr. Kavanaugh) form of the new Mass would have satisfied most people now turning to the old Mass. The Bishop Matins of the church are just as responsible for the new interest in the old Mass as Archbishop Lefebvre.
Father Anthony,
You are too steeped in logic! Fie! I totally agree with your analysis. Liberals, ironically, because of their abuse of the liturgy and Faithful, set the stage for this resurgence of interest in the TLM. The good news is that the demographics and time are working against them. Deus Vult!
As to Latin being the Latin spoken by ordinary folks in Rome, this is what Father Z has to say:
You know, in the ancient church they, you know, changed from Greek to Latin because it was, you know, the language the people spoke, the vernacular. If they could do it then, you know, so should we!
WRONG! When the shift was made from Greek to Latin, it was not to the Latin spoken in the street, as if in a play by Plautus. Liturgical prayer shifted to a highly stylized Latin, a Latin which was decidedly not the “vernacular” (from Latin verna, a native slave born within the house rather than born abroad). “Vernacular” came to indicate national language or mother-tongue. But liturgical Latin was not what was spoken in the houses and streets by our forebears. The choice of the ancient Church was a form of Latin redolent of ancient Roman prayer, filled with ornamental tropes, technical and philosophical vocabulary and images which was, so-to-speak, “baptized” to express an ever-deepening identity and theology.
Speaking of liturgy: I found the following interesting:
https://fatherfeeney.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/the-point-november-1955/
The Point – November 1955
Edited Under Fr. Leonard Feeney M.I.C.M. — Saint Benedict Center
"Now that Mass is being celebrated in front of television cameras, Catholics find they have to cope with problems of liturgy in their living rooms.
"Tuning in on the Holy Sacrifice, Catholics are faced with such considerations as: Should we go on smoking? Should we stop the card game? Should we get out our missals? Should we all get down on our knees at the Consecration?
"In the earlier days of the Church, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was thought so sacred that it was kept entirely concealed from unbelievers, lest it be blasphemed. Even catechumens were not allowed to witness its most solemn parts.
"The American hierarchy, however, are so remote from this kind of zeal for guarding holy things that they have abandoned the Mass to the barroom blasphemies and drawing room dismissals of the nation’s television viewers."
Pax.
Mark Thomas
Speaking of liturgy:
https://fatherfeeney.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/the-point-september-1954/
Father Leonard Feeney SJ. The Point – September 1954
"In an address before the Archdiocesan Teachers’ Institute held in Boston this month, it was predicted that, before long, Mass in the United States will be said in English.
"That such a prediction could be made matter-of-factly, even approvingly, indicates not merely a colossal provincialism, but also a loss of Faith.
"In the second issue of The Point, dated March, 1952, we warned of the possibility of a national schismatical church being formed in this country...one of the first, necessary steps toward establishing this schismatical American Catholic Church would be to substitute English, the language of the nation, for Latin, the language of the Church."
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The powerful movement to vernacularize the Mass had been underway well prior to Vatican II.
During the 1940s and 1950s, Father Feeney had reported upon the inevitable...that the determination to institute dramatic liturgical reforms had been underway within the Latin Church.
Certain folks here would have us believe that the liturgical reform had been imposed from top to bottom...imposed upon an unwilling laity who loved supposedly Mass in a language that they had not understood.
Nonsense.
As Father Feeney had long reported, the laity had clamored for venularization...for the overhaul of the Mass. One bishop after another supported that as well.
Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Father Feeney insisted that the overwhelming amount of laity and hierarchs had embraced Modernism.
The (Latin) Church, as well as Her primary Mass, had collapsed well prior to Vatican II, according to Father Leonard Feeney SJ.
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Each monthly edition of Father Feeney’s monthly publication, The Point, from February 1952 A.D., to March 1959 A.D.
https://fatherfeeney.wordpress.com/
Pax.
Mark Thomas
Another instance of feckless "leadership" by the bishops at large. Rome did make attempts to curb the abuses, but local ordinaries and religious superiors did little to nothing.
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