It may seem absurd that liturgically sensitive people should feel alienated from a liturgy that tries so hard to reach out to people through everyday language and popular music.
We Believe May 2005 [PDF] p. 4, from Worship June 2004
The absurdity is thinking there should be a necessary connection between the amount of effort and actual success. Yet such thinking seems to be everywhere. Raise a liturgical issue and it will be treated as an accusation that the people responsible for liturgy weren't trying or had bad intentions.
This reached the point at St. Al's that, at one parish council meeting, someone said there obviously were problems but we couldn't say anything to the Liturgy Committee because it would send them into a tizzy. There had been a parish survey years before and a few unfavorable results on liturgy still left the committee nursing hurt feelings.
Do you notice how this all insulates both the committee and the council from any accountablity to the parishioners? Raise an issue or point out a fact and you're trying to hurt someone's feelings. Instead, they have to be left doing things as they see fit.
Insofar as 'liturgical accountablity' is, really, in the Pastor's lap (search the Canons for a mention of "Liturgy Committee"--if you find one, I will buy breakfast...)
ReplyDeleteAnd Pastors are rarely held accountable by the Archdiocesan's Chief Teacher and Ruler...
Why bother?
What I call "shoulder-shrugging scandal".
ReplyDeletePerhaps.
ReplyDeleteFor me, it's more like "mileage-accumulating" scandal. I pay my temporal punishment-dues by picking up the mileage-penalty.
Further, since I tend to think that simply FIRING lit-commit members who can't think with the Church is appropriate and long overdue, or in the alternative, simply slapping them across the face---it's likely better that I take the 'mileage penalty.'
I've noticed that the Cathedral's Sunday bulletin contains short blurbs on "How We Celebrate Mass" from time to time. Today's bulletin warns against the practice of intinction. They were discussing this on Amy Welborn's blog a few weeks ago and I was lost - someone had to explain to me that it is the practice of dipping the Host into the consecrated Blood. I never knew the term for it, but that's a practice I remember being very prevalent in the '70's.
ReplyDeleteI think Abp.Dolan is doing his best to nudge his flock in the direction of proper liturgical practices. He celebrated Mass this morning and I prayed extra hard for him. The man has his work cut out for him - trying to rebuild what was lost here under the Reign of Rembert must be like trying to make cats march in a parade.
Sorry for the OT, but this might be of interest:
ReplyDeleteDr. Patrick Jung, a history professor at MSOE, gave a presentation today at the Cathedral debunking "The Da Vinci Code." He's a well-informed and very entertaining speaker and mentioned that he would be glad to speak at other parishes or schools in the archdiocese. If, like me, you know people who take Dan Brown's heretical twaddle very seriously indeed, you might want to contact Dr. Jung.
Dr. Jung gives his DVC lecture free of charge. There was a free-will offering taken up for the benefit of the MSOE Catholic student association. I found it very worth my while.
Look--with all due regard for the Sisyphean task of our Archbishop--
ReplyDeleteWhen he OWNS a newspaper and can get the Journal-Sentinel's attention with a whisper, why limit the audience to the 500 (???) readers of the Cathedral Bulletin?
B-16's "hints" on proper liturgical practice (displayed in his funeral Mass for JPII and again in his installation Mass) were broadcast to an audience of about 100 million (or more) worldwide.
Sisyphean? Let's not be despairing. Perhaps you meant Augean.
ReplyDeleteBut you have a point. I assume he could likewise make use of Relevant Radio.
The real policy at my parish is against communication. Maybe that's true at the archdiocesan level.