The Antipope Venerated as a Saint

The feast of St Martha is kept today with a commemoration of four Roman martyrs named Felix, Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrix. This commemoration originated as two separate observances, which seem to have been united because St Felix was buried in a catacomb named for him along the via Portuensis, the great ancient road which led to the port of Rome, while the other three were buried further down the same road in the Catacomb of Generosa. In earlier liturgical books, however, Felix is called “Pope Felix II”; this is true even in editions printed in the early 1950s, despite the fact that ever since the 1947 revision of the Annuario Pontificio, he has been officially listed as an antipope.

The Mass of Ss Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrix, and the Mass of St Felix, who is named only as a Martyr, in the Gellone Sacramentary (folio 97v), ca. 780 AD. (Bibliothèque nationale de France. Département des Manuscrits. Latin 12048)

Felix was the archdeacon of Rome in the mid-4th century, when the Church, so recently freed by the Emperor Constantine from pagan persecution, was subjected to its first “Christian” persecution by his son Constantius, an ardent supporter of the Arian heresy. In 355, the latter banished Pope Liberius to Greece for his opposition to Arianism, and Felix was consecrated by three Arian bishops to take his place. Although the majority of the Roman clergy apparently did recognize him as their bishop, the laity would have nothing to do with him. Two years later, when Liberius was permitted to return from exile, Felix and his supporters tried but failed to occupy the basilica of Pope Julius I (now known as Santa Maria in Trastevere); he was then banished from Rome by the Senate, never to return. After living for eight years near Porto in quiet retirement, he died in 365.

However, his entry in the Roman Martyrology before 1960 told the story differently. “At Rome, on the Via Aurelia, (the death of) St Felix the Second, Pope and Martyr, who, having been cast out of his see by the Arian Emperor Constantius because of his defense of the Catholic faith, died gloriously at Cera in Tuscany, being secretly slain by the sword.” According to the revised version of Butler’s Lives of the Saints by Herbert Thurston SJ and Donald Attwater, Felix was confused with two persons: first with his rival Liberius, which is difficult to explain, and secondly, with a martyr named Felix who was buried along the Via Aurelia, on which this Felix had built a small church. (Felix was an extremely common name in ancient Rome.) They also note that this confusion is already evidenced in documents of the 6th century. Therefore, the revised liturgical books of 1960, conforming to the updated Annuario Pontificio, eliminate the title “Pope” and the number “II” from his name, and delete his separate entry from the Martyrology altogether, while adding his name to that of the other three martyrs named above.

An engraved portrait of Cardinal Baronius, the frontispiece of a 1624 edition of his Annals. (Image from Wikimedia Commons by Jeffdelonge, CC BY-SA 3.0)

What I think is particularly interesting about this is not the hagiographical confusion per se, but rather the way this confusion is treated in the revised Butler’s Lives, which calls it “a sad memorial to the still backward state of critical scholarship at the time when Cardinal Baronius was editing (the Martyrology).” After noting that “(t)he insertion of Felix as Pope and Martyr was not any oversight, for Baronius in his annotated edition of the martyrology refers his readers for an elucidation of the matter to the volume of his great work, the Annales, which was on the point of appearing,” it goes on to ascribe all of the confusion to the Liber Pontificalis, a famous collection of Papal biographies, famously unreliable as an historical document.

It turns out, however, that Baronius’ treatment of the problem is far more detailed and interesting than the brief entry in Butler’s would lead one to believe.

First of all, Baronius did not “insert” Felix into the Martyrology; he was already in the Roman liturgical books (Missal, Breviary and Martyrology) before the Tridentine reform. Moreover, Baronius was perfectly well aware of the historical problem posed by his cultus. In the pre-Tridentine Roman breviary, (which he, as a member of the Roman Oratory, would certainly have used), the first lesson of Matins on July 29th tells the story of Felix II in terms similar to those of the Martyrology entry noted above. It is followed, however, by another lesson which gives the history of Pope St Felix III, who reigned from 483-92, and also staunchly opposed a heresy supported by the Roman Emperor, although he was not martyred for this. The prayer of this Office, however, names only one Felix; this strongly suggests that the compilers of this earlier edition of the Breviary hedged their bets, so to speak, as to which Pope named Felix was actually honored by the feast.

Two columns of a Roman Breviary printed at Venice in 1481, with the lessons for July 29th. On the lower left (“lectio prima”) is the historical lesson for the Felix II, and at the upper right (“lectio secunda”) the lesson for Felix III. Notice that in the title of the feast and in the Collect, only one Felix is mentioned.

In the Tridentine Breviary, both of these historical lessons were completely expunged, along with those of the other three martyrs, and their collective feast reduced to just a commemoration on the feast of St Martha. This change is a clear sign that that the editors, Baronius among them, were aware that the statements contained in the older lessons could not to be regarded as historically reliable.

Turning to the relevant entry in Baronius’ Annals (Liberii ann. 4, 56-58) mentioned in Butler’s Lives, we discover the real reason why the notice of Felix as “Pope” was retained. He points out that Felix was (to borrow an odious turn of phrase from modern politics) personally faithful to the Nicene confession of faith, although he did not therefore separate himself from communion with the Arians or refuse ordination at their hands; this, according to the testimony of two ancient Church historians, Sozomen and Theodoret of Cyrus. Since he was deacon under Liberius, who also held fast to the Nicene faith, Baronius thought it unlikely that the latter would promote a convinced heretic to the important position of archdeacon, or keep him in that role. Furthermore, he explains, Felix must have known that he could not legitimately be Pope if Liberius was unlawfully deposed by a heretical Emperor. It was therefore Baronius’ opinion that Felix had accepted episcopal ordination not as the unlawful replacement of Liberius, but rather as a “chorepiscopus”, the title of a bishop who took care of rural areas without a fixed see in a city; effectively, what we would nowadays call an auxiliary bishop. He would have accepted this role so as to not leave the Church of Rome without governance during the exile of its rightful pastor.

Baronius goes on to explicitly state that “what is said about Felix’s ordination in the book about the Roman Popes falsely attributed to the name of Pope Damasus (i.e. the Liber Pontificalis), does not seem to be at all true”, an important recognition of that book’s value (or lack thereof) as an historical source. Further on (Liberii ann. 6, 58), he also notes that the ancient sources were not in agreement as to Felix’s ultimate fate, whether he died in peace near Porto, as is now believed, or was condemned by Constantius and killed at Caere in Tuscany, as formerly stated in the Martyrology.

Baronius then gives an account (ibid. 62) of something which happened in his own time, which vindicates him from Thurston and Attwater’s charge of being a backward scholar. He writes that scholars had long accepted that Felix was an intruder in the papal office, and that the ancient sources did not agree on the circumstances of his death. Under Pope Gregory XIII (1572-85), several learned men had gathered in Rome to work on the revision of the Martyrology, and there had been a great deal of intense discussion among them specifically about the case of Felix. Baronius himself leaned strongly towards removing him altogether, and wrote a lengthy treatise in defense of this position, which found much support and agreement among his colleagues.

Mass for the Lenten Station at Ss Cosmas and Damian in 2017, photographed by our Roman pilgrim friend Agnese.

It happened, however, that in the year 1582, a side-altar of the very ancient church of Ss Cosmas and Damian in the Forum was moved, revealing a marble box that was divided into two parts by a stone slab. On the one side were the relics of three Martyrs, Ss Mark, Marcellian, and Tranquillinus; on the other, bones, and the following inscription on a small stone plaque: “The body of St Felix, Pope and Martyr, who condemned Constantius.” This discovery happened to take place on the day before his feast. “To the wonder of all, Felix himself seemed to appear as one come back to life, as if to personally take up his own cause, since he had been greatly overwhelmed by the pens of those who wrote against him. I myself, struck by no small wonder at an event of such greatness… with the moderation of a Christian, then curbed my pen, which I had sharpened in zeal for the truth, and deemed that it had most happily (felicissime) befallen me to be beaten by Felix.”

Now none of this is to say that Baronius’ assessment of the historical question was necessarily correct, or that the revisers of the liturgical books were wrong to do as they did in 1960 by joining Felix to the other martyrs. It is however, very much to say that whether he was ultimately right or wrong, Cardinal Baronius was not careless; he acted in good faith, and in the belief that divine providence had intervened to prevent the suppression of the long-standing veneration of a Saint.

Contrast this with the disdainful attitude of the supposedly far more sophisticated modern scholars, who speak of his work as the product of a “backward” state of affairs, but do not mention the discovery of the relics in connection with him, nor the reason why he changed his mind about St Felix. This cavalier and unjustified attitude of superiority has been all too common for far too long, and we have lived with the damage it has done to the Church’s tradition for far too long.

Historian Breaks New Ground in Vatican II Research, with Special Attention to Liturgical Reform

People today often ask questions like: “What in the world happened at the time of Vatican II, that the Church seemed in such an unholy hurry to change? Why were the changes so drastic and so sudden? What were the causes, the motives, the expectations, the assumptions about reform and its expected fruits? Who were the main actors? Was it planned out or random? Who benefited (cui bono)? How responsible were the bishops for it, versus the middle managers, versus the laity?” and so forth. It can be very hard to disentangle so many threads.

This is why professional historians exist. Professor Hanael Bianchi has spent 10 years researching, at the nitty-gritty level, how Vatican II was received and implemented in a particular (and very important) diocese, using archival materials, period documents, and firsthand accounts. The resulting book, A Liberal Revolution: The Implementation of Vatican II in the Archdiocese of Baltimore, will leave a permanent mark henceforth on all studies of the period.

Bianchi answers the above questions, one after the next – and brings the receipts. In an era of endless podcasting and spitballing, the disciplined work of research is more necessary than ever if we wish to gain a well-documented and well-organized account of complex events, while overturning faulty theories and clumsy generalizations from (…yes…) every part of the ecclesiastical spectrum.

While the Second Vatican Council has generated a large scholarly corpus, A Liberal Revolution is the first close-up history to be written of a single diocese in the years immediately following it. Using the see of Baltimore as a case study and drawing exclusively on primary sources, Bianchi reconstructs how the decrees of the Council in faraway Rome – and, more tellingly, the new ideas and attitudes prompted by it – were implemented and experienced on the local level, in parishes, seminaries, religious communities, retreat centers, and chancery offices.

The claim that the Church “embraced the modern world” after Vatican II is well known; this book sharpens it by focusing specifically on liberalism as the framework through which implementation took place. The study begins by tracing the dismantling of inherited traditions, then turns to the rise of individualism within Catholic life and governance, before arriving at its most original contribution: an analysis of the emergence of a dense church bureaucracy that embodied and enforced a liberal worldview.

Although the story told in these pages is a tragedy, A Liberal Revolution is no polemic; rather, it is a work of careful historical analysis grounded in years of research. It will not only contribute to the scholarly understanding of Vatican II and its aftermath but also offer guidance to Catholics seeking a path toward genuine renewal, grounded in a thorough and accurate assessment of what actually happened. Understanding the whats, hows, and whys of postconciliar disruption – a topic that, so far from fading into the past, has grown to be a most urgent task for the present – finds in Bianchi a uniquely capable guide.

NLM readers will find especially valuable Part 1, “Attack on Tradition and the Rise of the New,” divided into “The Priesthood Revolts,” “Novelty in Music and Architecture,” and “Liturgical Confusion.” Among other topics, Bianchi's presentation of the data concerning how the different age groups reacted to new policies shows that radical change was in fact extremely popular with the younger set of seminarians and priests (at least, until they left the seminary or the priesthood, as many of them did), and, at the same time, that diocesan policies repeatedly found ways to empower these reformatory forces while marginalizing older priests who were skeptical of the changes or even wished to continue with the traditional Mass in Latin. There is also liturgically relevant material in Parts 2 and 3.

Famed sociologist Dr. Stephen Bullivant, Professor of Theology and the Sociology of Religion and Director of the Benedict XVI Centre for Religion and Society at St. Mary’s University in London, calls A Liberal Revolution “a richly detailed account... an impressive piece of scholarship, beautifully written, very compelling, and highly recommended.”

Dr. Anne Hendershott, Professor of Sociology at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, concurs: “With historical precision and narrative force, this book shows how reforms reshaped Catholic life in unexpectedly negative ways, with consequences that still reverberate through the Church today.”

Veteran journalist and founder of the Catholic Culture site, Philip Lawler, finds in the book a crucial tool for understanding the bureaucratic mentality that has morphed into synodality: “[Bianchi documents how] the post-conciliar era saw a spectacular proliferation of offices, boards, and commissions at the diocesan level. This new bureaucracy developed its own interests in spurring change, regardless of either the formal directives of the Council or the wishes and needs of the faithful.”

Finally, poet and liturgist Barry Spurr sums up the effusive reactions of the book’s initial readers: “The importance and necessity of this book cannot be overstated. Bianchi reveals the destructive effects of the late 1960s mindset at the parochial level.”

A Liberal Revolution is available in paperback, hardcover with dust jacket (both pictured here), or ebook, either directly from the publisher Os Justi Press or from any Amazon site around the world. At both places, you can “look inside” to read the Introduction.

Cold and Hot Media: The Mass as a Medium

“Let’s Throw the Microphone Out of the Church!”

Paweł Jarnicki

Part 3

(See Part 1 | Part 2)

The difficulties in understanding McLuhan’s views on microphones may also stem from the fact that he assumes that the reader is familiar with his concepts presented in other texts. It is obvious that a microphone is a transmitter, that it is a medium. There is the one who speaks, there is the one who listens, and there is the message transmitted through the microphone.

But a casual reader may be surprised that McLuhan seems to suggest that the use of what he considers a “cold” microphone could “warm up” the Latin Mass (which he considers “cold”). What does it mean for media to be “cold” or “hot”?

In the simplest terms, a hot medium delivers information in “high definition”, in a form that minimizes the cognitive activity of the recipient. Take, for example, a contemporary entertainment film with surround sound and special effects. The recipient does not have to conjecture the details, does not have to imagine how something explodes, what someone is wearing, what a given interior looks like, what the background of a scene is, etc. (to stick to the realm of appearances). The recipient simply sees it, and is cognitively passive, because everything is “served on a plate.”

Cold media, on the other hand, provide information in “low definition”, in a form that requires cognitive activity on the part of the recipient; in order to assimilate the message, the recipient must “warm it up”. Someone who reads a novel has to conjecture a lot, has to imagine what the scene described in words looks like, has to complete a lot of details, construe a lot, and can do it in many ways to a certain extent. [1] So, although on the surface, just like a movie viewer, they do nothing (they do not move or speak), we understand that a book reader is more active than a viewer who simply surrenders to impressions.

Hot media make the audience cognitively passive, while cold media force cognitive activity, which is why, among other things, “the medium is the message,” because in the long run it changes the level of knowledge of a larger group of recipients. Continuing with our book-film example, let us note that the knowledge of students who have watched the film adaptation of a school reading is different from the knowledge of students who have carefully read the book.

In this sense, the type of medium has a greater impact on culture and society than the content of the message being conveyed. Regardless of whether it is Pan Tadeusz [the Polish national epic] or another story, more is “gained” from the reception of a cold medium. This is because a cold medium requires cognitive activity on the part of the recipient, an act that de facto creates a community.

After all, it is not state-issued ID cards or church baptism certificates that make us a community, but rather socialization into similar ways of “warming up” – completing, conjecturing, construing. If this seems too abstract, try to recall a social gathering. Jokes are often told at such gatherings, especially at the beginning, to build a shared mood. Jokes often involve some kind of understatement or mistake; the audience has to make a mental effort to “get it,” and shared laughter is proof that despite the ambiguity of the message, we “get it,” meaning we understand each other better and think alike. A momentary community is created. [2]

Another device that requires completion is... the parable. We usually think that their ambiguity served to ensure that only the chosen few understood them, so as not to cast pearls before swine, and we do not notice the other – or perhaps the first – side of the coin, that the ambiguity of certain statements, by forcing similar cognitive activity, builds a community.

Pius XII offering Mass at an altar with four microphones (only three visible). Photo courtesy of Nico Fassino

McLuhan writes about the microphone, but he also seems to think of the Mass as a medium, although he does not make this distinction explicitly. [3] If the Mass is a medium, then the speaker is the Church, the listener is the people of God, and what is communicated through the Mass is the deposit of Faith. Viewing the Mass as a medium helps us understand why the “cold” microphone “warmed up” the Holy Mass, because in the new Mass – with sound amplification, in vernacular, with the priest facing the people – everything is to be “high definition”: visible, audible, and understandable.

The traditional Mass was “low definition” – cold (“demanding”), like reading a book: the faithful had to complete for themselves what the priest was doing. They had dogmas as their guideposts. The new Mass is hot (“easy”), like watching a movie. However, even though the priest says everything loudly and in understandable language, it does not help at all to feel that he is addressing God and re-presenting the Sacrifice of Christ in an unbloody manner on behalf of the faithful. Continuing our analogy, the “plot” is supposedly the same (the deposit of Faith has not changed), but the level of “knowledge” of the faithful is radically different.

It is possible that illiterate people of past eras (raised on the old Mass) had a deeper faith than those among contemporary intellectuals (raised on the new Mass) who have remained in the Church and so “actively” participate in the new Masses. They read the readings, carry the gifts, and above all, they do not pray the rosary during Mass (a very common example!). “Traditionalists” often mock this “activism.” However, no one can explain what is wrong with it.

The paradox is that although the theoretical goal of the Mass reform was to increase the participation of the faithful (participatio actuosa), in practice the effects are the opposite of what was intended. The changes introduced (which were intended to increase clarity and comprehensibility, i.e., to “warm up” the Mass) have only increased external activity and suppressed internal activity, which is truly community-building. Contemporary Catholic communities that shake hands after meetings and say, “It’s good to have you here,” may in fact be superficial communities. Only internal, cognitive activity creates a deeper community, creates the Church.

If during the new Mass, where everything is seemingly clear, obvious, and understandable, the faithful do not have to complete anything themselves or conjecture anything (which is very difficult anyway, because they are flooded with many more stimuli), then they absorb the content of the reading to a much lesser extent, and their membership in the Community becomes increasingly formal. They cease to feel unity with other members of the Mystical Body. This is the first, painful consequence of introducing the microphone into the Church, concerning the Community. The second concerns the Word.

The church of St Matthäus in Düsseldorf, Germany. Notice the obligatory centrality of the mic, with the processional cross and candles to the side. The overhead crucifix only partly cancels out the effect.

Omnimediatization

After my conversion, I saw and heard many Masses. Very different ones. I quickly turned to traditional Masses, although I never rejected the new ones. I read about the reform, about non-believers and Protestants who once converted, enchanted by the beauty of the Latin Mass. And then they experienced the reform and the pentecostalization of Catholicism. And I began to wonder if today’s Mass could “captivate” someone enough to convert them. If I bring a non-believing friend to Mass in my parish, is there anything here that might delight them? It’s a difficult question...

The vast majority of new Masses are chaotic, and at times even noisy and cacophonous. The new Mass is not appealing at all. I have often wondered whether it is inertia or a miracle that people still come here. In today’s churches, too many things are shoddy, kitschy, and inconsistent. Plastic chasubles and hubbub stand in stark contrast to the thoughtful design and ornamentation of old churches.

Among the more “difficult” experiences, I include the contemporary new Masses known as “children’s,” “for children,” or “family” Masses. Much could be written about them, but I will focus here on one way in which the microphone is used during them. The moment of the homily arrives. The priest does not approach the pulpit or climb into the ambo, but takes a portable microphone, leaves the presbytery and goes into the nave (in front of the balustrade, which is not there) and calls the children to him. They crowd around him. Instead of a sermon, he gives a catechesis and asks the children questions. The children answer. The priest is happy, the parents are happy, because the children are “actively participating” and the content is good and pious. What’s wrong with that?

We already know that the content is actually secondary, because the primary message is the medium. And no one at this Mass is surprised that the priest speaks through a microphone to the children who are within arm’s reach. No one is surprised that they answer him through the same microphone, even though they are standing right next to him. And once during such a Mass, the priest, who after his sermon-catechesis had already asked all the children about their Mass intentions, turned – of course through that portable microphone, of course – to the adults remaining in the pews with the question: “Perhaps the floor has some intentions?”

This servant of the Lord’s constantly devasted vineyard, whose piety and good faith I am firmly convinced of, simply picked up the message from the microphone. He called the faithful who participate in the Sacrifice “the floor.” But it’s really not his fault. He was about 40 years old, so he was raised on Mass with a microphone.

It was only while writing this article that I realized how mediatized our world is, how it is mediated by the means of communication. [4] I tried to find contemporary social events that are not mediatized, and the only things that came to mind were school classes and some funerals of “insignificant people.” It was a shocking discovery for me that there are basically no more social events that are not mediatized. We have to see and hear everything.

Nothing should be left unbroadcast.

And yet, a hundred years ago in Fatima, over 70,000 people came, even though they couldn’t see. They came because they heard that something was occurring. But there was no sound system or zoom on site. They had no guarantee that they would see or hear anything, even if they were right in the center of events. The photos from Fatima in 1917 are, of course, a means of communication, but they are only documents; the events in Fatima themselves were not mediatized for their participants. That is, the means of communication were there, but they were... children, flesh-and-blood children.

Our world has changed significantly over the past hundred years. This would not have been possible without microphones and sound systems. The first such systems were developed around 1915, and two years later, during Christmas 1917 in San Francisco, the Magnavox sound system was publicly presented. In the same year, Our Lady of the Rosary appeared in Fatima. The carbon microphone was invented forty years earlier, in 1876. In 1877, Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception appeared in Gietrzwałd. And seven years later, in 1884, Pope Leo XIII had a truly Job-like vision, or rather “hearing,” because the revelation was (indeed!) acoustic in nature. Jesus spoke with Satan, who, wanting to attempt to destroy the Church (the deposit of Faith!), demanded [5] time (from 75 to 100 years) and greater power over those who would devote themselves to his service. Jesus was to allow this, and Satan chose the “coming” century (usually interpreted, but on what basis is unknown, as the 20th century).

Terrified by this revelation, Leo XIII decided that all priests would recite a set of prayers after low Masses (during the week), kneeling at the foot of the altar (the old one, i.e., together with the people, versus Deum), which were later called “the Leonine Prayers.” These prayers are no longer recited today except at the old Mass (though sometimes their echo can still be heard when, after a parish Mass, the prayer to St. Michael the Archangel is recited). The obligation to recite the Leonine Prayers as an “add-on” was abolished by the Consilium led by Bugnini in 1964.

I must admit that when I heard that the new pope had chosen the name Leo, I felt hopeful that this was not a random choice. Although the content of Leo XIII’s revelations is known to many believers, and many believers are familiar with other predictions of a crisis in the Church, priests today do not explain this to the faithful in a convincing manner. For believers, can such temporal coincidences as those mentioned above be purely accidental? Is the intensification of Marian apparitions accidental? Has Jesus really allowed Satan to destroy the Church? When? When will it end? Has it already begun? What would it consist of? Is it a coincidence that God’s people are lost in conjectures and conspiracy theories when the voice of the shepherds has become a processed voice?

Although succession in the Church must still be accomplished through the direct laying on of hands, the Word that priests proclaim today is transmitted. This may seem insignificant to us, but the sound that comes from the speakers is, contrary to appearances, heavily processed, so that the sound does not overlap with the echo of what was said a moment ago. [6] In addition, the priest’s voice today reaches the faithful from all directions (the nearest speaker may even be behind them); it is a “dis-placed” voice. In the past, it had one natural source in the priest’s body. This causes confusion, which is not visible in adults today because they are already accustomed to it, but it can be seen in some of the youngest children (who enter the space of a mass event with a transmitted human voice, not only in church). The microphone created, as McLuhan put it, a “sound bubble.”

This led to the actual elimination of the age-old division of the Temple into three zones (tabernacle – Holy of Holies; presbytery – Holy Place; nave – vestibule), which, in short, does not help the faithful understand that the most important part of the Mass takes place there, in the presbytery, in a slightly different space behind the balustrades. In fact, today the balustrade is often no longer there, because the sound bubble has made the space of churches a homogeneous space of encounter around the Table-Altar.

The voice also sounds at a similar volume all the time (in the old Mass, the priest sometimes spoke loudly, sometimes moderately, sometimes in a whisper). The microphone not only dis-placed the Word proclaimed during Mass, but also, as McLuhan puts it, discarnated it. It is precisely this second, painful consequence of the introduction of the microphone into the Church that concerns the Word.

TLM, Rome (Italy), Church of the Most Holy Trinity of the Pilgrims. A medium-sized church during a traditional Mass does not require a sound system; the cross is the axis of the celebration.

TLM, Vilnius (Lithuania), Church of St. Anne. A church without a single microphone, neither at the altar nor at the ambo.

Discarnation of the Word

The lord of death is unable to be born of a virgin like God. The lord of death cannot have his own body. At most, he can enter the bodies of those born naturally. The Church has developed methods to combat possession. But it has not noticed the new trick of the lord of death – a trick with a much greater destructive power than possession: the trick of the discarnation of the Word, which distorts the transmission of the deposit of Faith. That is why I say: Let’s throw the microphone out of the Church!

“Even then Cassandra, who, by the god’s decree, is never / to be believed by Trojans, reveals our future fate with her lips.”

I saw that on most of the new altars, the microphone had taken the place of the cross. The cross stood to the side or behind and became an ornament. Priests today move around the microphone.

But whatever happens, as the Church says, the Lord will come. He was born at night, he comes in silence, he will rise from the heights and illuminate the darkness.

Christmas Day, 2025

NOTES

^[1] Let us note in the margin that after a film with special effects, it is more difficult to have a meaningful conversation with other viewers (often these conversations do not go beyond “did you see that” or “that was great”), it is more difficult to talk about such films because we saw the same thing and everything was obvious. When, on the other hand, someone has read the same novel (I don’t mean a crime novel) at the same time, it is often easier to talk about it because we understand many issues and imagine them slightly differently.

^[2] Of course, it happens that a narcissistic character dominates a party that consists only of jokes, or that jokes quickly reveal that we will not understand each other, that there will be no community, because completing them would mean repeating stereotypes that offend us. Metaphors are a community-building device similar to jokes, although not as easy to notice. Due to their ambiguity, they also force the listener to make cognitive effort and create a community. In the presence of those who use metaphors that do not offend us, but are close to us, ones that we understand almost instinctively, we feel better.

^[3] This is how, by the way, Ashil D. Manohar develops McLuhan’s idea in his thesis entitled The Mass is the Medium: Marshall McLuhan and Roman Catholic Liturgical Change (2021). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations. https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/8817. Such an approach may seem strange at first, but it is not foreign to official church documents. Cf. e.g. p. 11 of the pastoral instruction on social communications Communio et progressio: “Communication is more than the expression of ideas and the indication of emotion. At its most profound level it is the giving of self in love. Christ’s communication was, in fact, spirit and life (Jn 6:53). In the institution of the Holy Eucharist, Christ gave us the most perfect and most intimate form of communion between God and man possible in this life, and, out of this, the deepest possible unity between men.”

^[4] I also realized that this world is coming to an end because of “Artificial Intelligence,” because it is beginning to eat its own tail. Trust in the media began to crumble earlier (because we began to realize that “the press lies” and “television lies” also today, and not just “during communism” behind the Iron Curtain), but AI will complete this process — once we realize that with its help, our and foreign intelligence services, criminals, and enlightened minds are able to generate hyper-realistic fake news, we will completely lose trust in our “extended senses.” In my opinion, it is only a matter of time before zones free from all kinds of technology begin to emerge. Churches could be at the forefront of this!

^[5] I do not have access to the relevant sources, but in reports that can be found on the Internet, Satan’s voice is described as “guttural” or “harsh” , and Artificial Intelligence confirms that early microphones caused such sound distortion and that the human voice transmitted through them was often described as “harsh,” “distorted,” or “raspy.”

^[6] This is necessary due to the “outdated” architecture of churches, which was designed for natural voices. Traditional methods of amplifying sound, apart from architecture, were based on the construction of the ambo — raised above the people. A canopy was installed above the pulpit, whose function was not only decorative — the canopy reflected the sound and directed it downwards towards the people, and in addition, a soundboard was often placed in it. However, all these measures amplified the priest’s live and unprocessed voice.

The Microphone as a Social Actor

“Let’s Throw the Microphone Out of the Church!”

Paweł Jarnicki

Part 2

(See Part 1 | Part 3)

McLuhan coined two well-known phrases, the first being “global village” and the second “medium is the message.” While it is easy to understand that, due to the rapid circulation of information, we all live in a “global village” today, it is more difficult to comprehend that the medium itself is also a message. McLuhan meant that the medium itself has a strong influence on the audience. It is not that, for example, the type of telephone affects the content of everyday conversations, because intuitively this influence seems minimal, but that the telephone (especially in the form of a “smartphone”) has changed the nature of interpersonal relationships in the long term and even influences our personality and perception. The impact of landline telephones was not as easily noticeable as the impact of instant messaging on the peer relationships and state of mind of young people is today, as seen from the perspective of people in their forties and fifties.

Some inventions profoundly change life in the world, in ways we cannot predict at the time of their implementation. This was obvious to McLuhan in the 1970s. A decade later, Bruno Latour popularized this idea by developing the “actor-network theory.” In this theory, society is not just people, but a network of “actors” that influence it, including material objects and... abstract concepts.

When society adopts a new technology, it does not usually discuss the possible long-term consequences of the actions of such an inhuman actor. We have imposed a series of tests on the production of new drugs, but we did not discuss the possible effects of social media before its introduction. Only after some time do we begin to realize the consequences of including them in our network: serious analyses appear that show that these new actors have a destructive effect on democratic systems, and artists also begin to explore the topic of their negative impact on young people (let us mention the recent success of the difficult mini-series Adolescence).

In the actor-network theory, the concept of bacteria is also such a social actor. It is not that bacteria did not exist before this concept. The point is that the organization of the human world did not take this concept into account. And when this concept became an actor in our societies, our behaviors and habits in terms of hygiene changed fundamentally.

The Church had always been very cautious about introducing technical innovations, especially in churches, so the influence of such worldly, soulless actors on the liturgy was relatively small. And sometimes the Church was able to harness technical innovations to achieve its own goals. When it came to “media” inventions, this was certainly the case with the invention of printing.

NOM, Vilnius (Lithuania), Sanctuary of the Divine Mercy. At the new Mass, everyone must hear and see everything.

The Church’s reactions to the inventions of printing and the microphone

For McLuhan, as a media theorist, two inventions were revolutionary for our civilization: the printing press and the microphone. He realized that these (from today’s perspective) simple creations radically changed the world we live in, and changed it in ways that the people who witnessed the introduction of these inventions could not have predicted. These two inventions have twice reinforced the position of vernacular languages, i.e., the languages we speak every day.

The first reinforcement was visual, because printing completed the process initiated by the invention of the phonetic alphabet and caused us to move from an oral-acoustic culture to a visual-linear culture. It sounds complicated, but the point is that sight became the dominant sense in our perception of the world and in our culture. Earlier culture was more “auditory,” centered around hearing, and in fact multisensory with a slight advantage for hearing. According to McLuhan, printing has led us to a visual culture, one in which sight clearly dominates. What is the difference?

Hearing does not “see” contours [1] and works more synthetically. It integrates our experience of the world into a whole; we also hear from many sides at once. Sight sees contours, analyzes and divides our experience of the world into pieces – it has made our perception more sequential and abstract; we also focus our sight in one direction. Thus, our perception of the world and our culture have changed, which, thanks to printing – thanks to the shift in emphasis to visuality – has gained unprecedented momentum. But at the same time, all contours have become more important: divisions, segmentations, specializations, and in the longer term... nationalisms.

These cultural changes also had an impact on liturgy. As McLuhan writes, it might seem that “the demand for a vernacular liturgy arose spontaneously in the sixteenth century, but it isn’t so. In fact, that demand was linked to the invention of print, an invention that accentuated people’s need to push towards individualism and nationalism. Add to that the fact that printed texts gave rise to textual exegesis from the pulpit. And finally, the new accent on the visual favored placing the celebrant face to face with the congregation: we needed to see him and he wanted to be seen.” [2] According to McLuhan, the fact that greater emphasis was placed on preaching in the 16th century and that Protestant priests turned to face the people was a consequence of the invention of printing. According to him, “Medieval liturgy was mostly acoustic,” and in Reformed churches it became more visual.

In response to the invention of printing, the Council of Trent developed the Decretum de edendis sanctis litteris et facultate utendi iis, and Pius V issued the apostolic constitution Quo primum tempore, thus defining the rules for the use of the new invention and regulating its use during ceremonies. Thanks to this, Catholics living in the world after the invention of printing, in the (as McLuhan describes it) “Gutenberg Galaxy,” that is, those who already had the need to see everything, accepted that there are certain things that cannot be seen in the sacred liturgy of the Church. This is important because we use our sight to construct the world as a set of static, permanent objects that have contours (for the ear, everything is more “fluid”), so making everything visible, to put it mildly, did not facilitate belief in the transubstantiation and Real Presence of God in the sacrament of the Altar. When you see the contours, it is more difficult to believe that the host is transformed into the Body of Christ. The effects of shifting the emphasis to visuality are clearly visible among Protestants, who have lost their belief in the Real Presence.

In the 16th century, the Roman Catholic Church not only resisted the worldly impact of the invention of printing, but also harnessed the new technology to standardize and consolidate existing liturgical practices and centralize the one and only Church. And how the Church transformed the worldly emphasis on visuality, i.e., the need to see that was created among the laity living in the world, can still be seen today in Baroque churches.

NOM, Vilnius (Lithuania), Catholic church; I don’t remember which one. This beautiful high altar surmounted by a crucifix became simply a decorative background.

The second historical reinforcement – auditory – was given to vernacular languages by the microphone.

First, new mass media appeared, thanks to the microphone, radio and television developed. The circulation of information, this time also in the form of sounds, accelerated even more. In public spaces, we began to hear different sounds from all sides at the same time. Television began to use sight like hearing, and we began to perceive images as sound, with our eyes focused on a single point, we could begin to see and hear the entire scene.

Secondly, the nature of mass events changed: without the microphone, there would be no numerous competitions and championships, popular concerts, or demonstrations.

Thirdly, thanks to the microphone, new figures emerged. As McLuhan significantly notes, without the microphone there would have been no Gandhi or Hitler. The vernacular began to reign supreme in the public sphere, in a version increasingly close to colloquial language.

According to McLuhan, the overall impact of the microphone on culture is the opposite of that of print; because of the microphone, we have begun to return to an acoustic culture. Today’s culture is in some ways more reminiscent of that of the pre-literate era; we are returning from individualism to tribalism (we are more empathetic today, but only towards people from our own “tribe”); our perception has become non-sequential (non-linear), but immediate and holistic (rather than abstract, because it is difficult to “hear” contours).

So how could a microphone, which reversed the “visual” effects of printing on culture, cause the same “visual” changes in Catholic liturgy that printing caused among Protestants? Although the overall impact of the microphone on culture seems to be the opposite, both inventions have intensified the mediatization of our experience of the world. Today, we have a deeply rooted need to see and hear everything through the media, which are like extensions of our senses. If we cannot see and hear something through the media, we find it difficult to believe in it. [3] And since, with the microphone, we introduced into the Church the worldly need to hear everything, its older sister – the need to see everything – came along with it. And that is why, in the liturgical dimension, thanks to the microphone, the Church quickly “made up” for what it had previously “neglected” during the first visual reinforcement of vernacular languages. Priests who turn to the people and speak in their vernacular often behave as if they do not believe in the Real Presence.

The Church did not notice that the microphone was a new “actor.” Although the Second Vatican Council issued the decree Inter mirifica in 1963, it concerns social media, i.e., those used in the world. [4] The last council did not issue any document that would harness the microphone for the Church’s own purposes. And since the Church did not consider the issue of the microphone, this new worldly “actor” has been influencing the liturgy for almost a hundred years in the same way that it influences the world. And Catholics born into servitude should know who rules this world.

This approach sheds light on the contemporary crisis of the Church without attributing ill will to anybody, and explains the reason for the pentecostalization described in contemporary academic literature, i.e., the similarities between contemporary Catholic liturgical practices and Protestant practices. Some “traditionalists” (I believe in good faith) suggest that the new Masses imitate Protestants. This superficial observation often rightly outrages “new Catholics.”

In fact, these are deeper processes. “New Catholics” do not imitate Martin Luther, but succumb to the worldly influences of printing technology and microphones; they enter God’s temples with the same expectations there as they have in the world. Moreover, even many Church documents from the second half of the 20th century say that the faithful should “hear without difficulty.” [5] However, no one has considered whether it is really necessary for the faithful to hear everything during Mass. Isn’t it enough for them to assist at Mass, as they have done for eons?

By placing microphones on altars – in the place where God appears – we have introduced a Trojan horse into the Church: the microphone, and in it, the worldly need to hear and see everything. However, just as it is not necessary to see everything during Mass, it is also not necessary to hear everything. It is enough to look, listen, and... believe.

Against appearances, these are not subtle but fundamental differences, because the need to see and hear everything introduced into the Church by microphones has serious consequences. In Part 3, I will discuss two of them: those concerning the Community and those concerning the Word. [6] 

NOM, Vilnius (Lithuania), Our Lady of the Gate of Dawn. If the altar can’t be turned around, the speaker will ensure that everyone can hear everything

NOTES

^[1] The piano keyboard is an artificial creation.

^[2] Pierre Babin, Liturgy and Media: (Marshall McLuhan’s) Third Conversation with Pierre Babin, in: Eric McLuhan and Jacek Szklarek (eds.), The medium and the light: Reflections on Religion, Toronto: Stoddart 1999, p. 142.

^[3] This trend will most likely be reversed by artificial intelligence; see footnote 22.

^[4] Subsequently, based on Inter mirifica, a very enthusiastic pastoral instruction on the means of social communication, Communio et progressio, was developed in 1971 (“So, ‘among the wonderful technical inventions’ (Inter mirifica) which foster communication among human beings, Christians find means that have been devised under God’s Providence for the encouragement of social relations during their pilgrimage on earth”). On its twentieth anniversary, another instruction was published, entitled Aetatis Novae, which is no longer so enthusiastic (“the application of communications technology has been a mixed blessing”), but fails to identify the cause of the problem. These documents are about the press, radio, and television, and do not recognize the inventions from which they originated. It is like considering the impact of various computer programs without noticing the invention of the computer.

^[5]General Introduction to the Roman Missal (2010), point 311: “Care should be taken to ensure that the faithful be able not only to see the Priest, the Deacon, and the readers but also, with the aid of modern technical means, to hear them without difficulty.” See also no. 34 in the General Introduction to the Lectionary (1981): “Provision must also be made for the readers to have enough light to read the text and, as required, to have modern sound equipment enabling the faithful to hear them without difficulty.”

^[6] I will present more arguments against microphones in churches in a separate text, which will be included in an anthology that I will publish in Polish.

Could the Introduction of Microphones Have Caused the Reform of the Mass?

We are very pleased to share the following thought-provoking essay by Paweł Jarnicki, which was first published in Polish at Christianitas. The text has been translated into English with the support of machine translation and will be published at NLM in three installments, this week and next. It is one of the most insightful treatments of the question I have ever seen, and deserves a careful read. – PAK

“Let’s Throw the Microphone Out of the Church!”

Paweł Jarnicki

Part 1

I narrated battles
bastilles and ships…
and forgot about tamarisk. [1]

Eleven years ago, shortly after my conversion, as I listened to a priest muttering a bland sermon, a postulate arose in my mind that has returned to me regularly ever since: Take the microphones away from the priests! After all, if this priest spoke without a microphone, he couldn’t mutter like that. He would have to know what he wanted to say. He would have to speak loudly and clearly. He would have to exert his body... Since when have there been microphones in churches anyway?... I looked around. There were definitely no microphones when this church was built. How did everything work before microphones came along? At that time, I knew nothing about the reform of the Mass.

I talked to several people about my postulate from time to time, and even started taking some notes, but it was only a year ago that I checked if anyone had already written anything on the subject. I searched exclusively on the Internet. I found literally a few valuable texts in English and a few paragraphs in Polish. I am trying to put my own thoughts and what I have read into a coherent whole here. This is by no means an academic text or a complete study of the subject, but rather a text written by a believer in the hope that it will spark discussion and provoke more competent people to conduct in-depth research and take action.

Let’s start with what is certain. It is certain that microphones are found in almost every Catholic church today — at organs, pulpits, ambo, and altars. Sometimes portable microphones are also used. They are accompanied, of course, by an amplifier (usually in the sacristy or near the organist) and loudspeakers — at least a few — even in the smallest churches and chapels.

It is also certain that for the vast majority of time, there were no microphones in churches. Although the carbon microphone was invented in the 1870s, and the first sound systems (microphone + amplifier + loudspeaker) were developed in the mid-1910s, they were not installed in churches until the 1920s and 1930s.

Available publications indicate that there were no serious discussions about the use of microphones in churches. And yet, at that time, there were disputes about broadcasting Mass on the radio or introducing projectors and players... But microphones? It seems that they were treated as something natural and fundamentally good. Just as glasses allow us to see more clearly, microphones allow us to hear more clearly. What could be wrong with hearing better?

In official church documents, the first mention of the amplification system can be found in the 1958 instruction On Music. It prohibits the use of automatic organ, phonograph, radio, tape or wire recorders, and other similar machines (71), and projectors (73), but “loudspeakers may be used even during liturgical functions, and private devotions for the purpose of amplifying the living voice of the priest-celebrant or the commentator” (72). [2] The microphone was therefore treated as something that merely “amplifies the living voice,” as an object as neutral, in fact, as a pair of glasses. Later documents that I have been able to find treat the “altar microphone” as something so obvious that they only require a second, separate microphone to be placed on the pulpit. [3]

Today, practically no one is surprised by microphones in churches, because they are ubiquitous in the world, transparent, and we swim like fish in water in amplified sounds, both in public and private spaces. Since microphones and loudspeakers are everywhere, it seems normal that they are also in churches. However, reading texts about microphones by other authors led me to the surprising thesis that the microphone caused the reform of the Holy Mass. I have read a lot about the reform over the last nine years, but that it was caused by the microphone?

NOM, Łukęcin (Poland), Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of Poland. In newly built churches, the cross is usually placed next to the altar, and the microphone becomes the axis of the celebration.

Two narratives about the reform of the Mass

In order to reconstruct the impact of the microphone on the 1969 reform of the Mass, it is good to familiarize ourselves with the current narratives about this reform. Especially since many contemporary Catholics know nothing about it, even though many “epics” have already been written about the controversy surrounding it... There are basically two narratives. Those enthusiastic about the reform and its critics. The enthusiastic narrative says: The reform of the Mass is the work of the Council, so it is good. The critical narrative says: The reform of the Mass is a consequence of the invasion of modernism, so it is bad. Although today (after Benedict XVI) the enthusiasts of the reform more often speak of continuity, and its critics of a break, there are also reverse variants. There were and are enthusiasts of the reform who speak of a break, and there are also critics of the reform who acknowledge continuity.

Critics of the reform argue that the world and people have not changed in essence, so there was no need to change the Mass, yet it was changed significantly. Enthusiasts of the reform say that as a result of increased well-being and technological development, “times” have changed, so the reform of the Mass was necessary to adapt it to contemporary pastoral needs, and only the envelope has changed, not the essence of the Mass.

The most radical critical narrative can be found among sedevacantists (those who believe that there is currently no legitimate pope) — recognizing the new Mass as invalid must also undermine recent pontificates, because several popes have already celebrated the new Mass. Therefore, the greatest concern of humble critics of the reform is how to criticize the reform without denying the validity of the new Mass and the continuity of the Church as an institution headed by the pope, and how not to cast the Second Vatican Council as the “villain.” The latter term allows reform enthusiasts to easily place critics outside the Church, because the Holy Spirit is at work during the council, and it is clear on whose side those who fight against the Divine Person are.

More moderate critics of the reform point out that the conciliar constitution on the liturgy neither recommended that the priest turn towards the people (versus populum) nor recommended a complete transition to vernacular languages. This was only done by the Consilium led by Annibale Bugnini — the reform is therefore a “distortion” of the Council’s decisions. Enthusiasts say that the Consilium implemented the “spirit” of the Council, while critics say that there is no such thing — that its “letter” has been violated. More radical critics point out that the errors of modernism (the omission of some ideas and the vague formulation of others) were already present in the conciliar documents and that the last council was not dogmatic, but only pastoral.

In any case, the common denominator of both narratives is the awareness of a crisis in the Church, the most striking manifestation of which is the decline in the number of priestly vocations. And no one has any idea how to break out of the trenches of their own convictions. Those on one side of the dispute see aggressive madmen, while those on the other see thoughtless blind men. This inability to reach an agreement confirms that some kind of break has indeed occurred. After all, it is easy to see that the new Mass is unlike the old one and that Catholics behave differently during the new and old Masses. Catholics raised on the new Mass who are unaware of the reform, when they encounter the old Mass, even have the impression that it is some kind of “different faith.” In the critical narrative, it is pointed out that since the way we pray has changed, our faith has changed (lex orandi lex credendi), but enthusiasts treat these critics as a threat to the unity of the Church, which today prays mostly according to the new Mass. These “accomplished facts” are the final argument of new Mass enthusiasts, but critics who emphasize continuity consider them dishonest because they imply a profound break — can the Mass on which the saints from before the last council were raised be so bad that it is forbidden to celebrate it in all parish churches? There seems to be no possibility of agreement.

The weaker, critical side feels — not without reason — that it is a victim of institutional violence (which to some extent explains, but does not excuse, the “aggressive” behavior of “traditionalist” circles). The problem, or perhaps its solution, is that here the “perpetrators” may also turn out to be victims of deception... For both narratives, both radical and moderate, forget about the microphone... which, like a Trojan horse, we ourselves introduced into the Church without considering the possible consequences.

NOM, Wrocław (Poland), St. Faustina Church. The object between the altar and the cross is not a Paschal candle but a portable loudspeaker.

Could the microphone have caused the reform of the Mass?

Although the hierarchs did not debate the issue of microphones, there was one layman who, in 1974, five years after the reform of the Mass, wrote:

“Many people will lament the disappearance of the Latin Mass from the Catholic Church without realizing that it was a victim of the microphone on the altar.” [4] And he repeated this thought three years later: “Latin wasn’t the victim of Vatican II; it was done in by introducing the microphone. A lot of people, the Church hierarchy included, have been lamenting the disappearance of Latin without understanding that it was the result of introducing a piece of technology that they accepted so enthusiastically.” [5]

The statements of Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) have gone almost completely unnoticed, even in today’s so-called “traditionalist” circles. [6] Why? I think that the rest of his text is too “dense.” It is a challenging text, difficult to understand even for readers educated in the humanities. Although McLuhan was a Catholic, he was neither a historian nor a theologian; his voice was the voice of a representative of what was then a new discipline of knowledge — media theory. What McLuhan says in this text also contradicts the (enthusiastic) intellectual mood that prevailed after the Council and for decades thereafter — McLuhan points to church architecture as a second victim of the microphone, alongside the Latin Mass, and predicts that the publication of the Holy Scriptures in vernacular languages by official committees will be counterproductive to the spread of the Good News. In a situation where literature adapts subsequent variations of the living colloquial national language, the Church rigidifies the vernacular in its official and archaic translation. And yet every vernacular continues to evolve, so rigidifying it detaches faith from the living language of national communities and significantly hinders the transmission of faith.

McLuhan says all this in a deliberately vague way, wanting to force readers to make a cognitive effort. In addition, it seems that in the following years, the prevailing belief was that the widespread use of microphones in churches was a consequence of the reform of the Mass (chronologically, microphones were first introduced in more important churches, and only after the reform in all churches).

It was only Nico Fassino’s article three years ago that showed that McLuhan may be right, that the opposite may be true [7] – that there would be no new Mass if it weren’t for the microphone. Not only because during the Council it could have been turned off and Cardinal Ottaviani silenced, [8] but above all because the microphone was placed on the altar.

Fassino’s article is, so far, the only one that begins to describe the process of introducing microphones into churches from a historical perspective. Thanks to him, we know that in the 1920s, microphones began to be used in pulpits and the first Masses were broadcast on the radio. However, the first radio broadcasts did not necessarily involve sound systems in the church itself. It was probably Pius XII, who had been in office since 1939 and still celebrated the old Mass, who was the first pope to place microphones on the altar. [9] We do not yet know the exact date when this happened, but it was most likely between 1939 and 1945. And since microphones were placed on the papal altar, this must have gradually become more common practice in the post-war years.

But could such a seemingly neutral object have brought about a reform of the Mass? How? In the following reconstruction, I draw heavily on McLuhan’s text:

1. The microphone on the altar made the Latin texts audible, which until then had largely reached the faithful only as incomprehensible whispers and murmurs (especially during quiet Masses celebrated on weekdays, but also during the quiet parts of solemn Masses on holidays).

2. The amplification of the words spoken in Latin created a need to hear them clearly — if someone amplifies sound, it means that they want to be heard, that there is something that needs to be heard). [10]

3. And since the faithful began to hear words rather than murmurs, the need to hear clearly was followed by the need to understand what was being heard [11], and thus

4. the need to speak during Mass in the languages used in everyday life, in languages known to the faithful — in their vernacular languages.

5. And since the faithful began to hear and needed to understand every word, the impression arose that it was they who were being addressed.

6. This led to an inconsistency in the communication situation — when someone speaks to us and we speak to someone, it is natural to expect that we will have our faces turned towards each other.

The priest’s reversal was therefore a consequence of placing a microphone on the altar. But at the same time, it also reinforced the needs created by the use of the microphone – hearing and understanding – and thus speaking in an understandable vernacular language. This is why reversing the Mass reform seems impossible today – the faithful must now see and hear everything. In any case, it was the microphone that set off the avalanche of the reform. If anyone doubts this, let them imagine the new Mass at the sanctuary in Łagiewniki, Krakow – without a sound system. [12]

Wait a minute, someone will say, microphones are now used even in “Latin rite ministries”. I think that microphones at traditional Masses are only acceptable in “ghettos” where rebellious believers are sent, who are not only resigned to hearing Latin, but actually consciously want to hear it (which is often the basis of their sense of superiority, and for “new Catholics” this “exaltation” is an unacceptable barrier). Moreover, microphones have become so ubiquitous in the world today that almost no one – even the most ardent “traditionalists” — would dream of questioning their use. Why should we give up the achievements of science and technology?

This question will be taken up in Part 2.

NOM, Jarnice (Poland), St. James Church. Today, sound systems are installed even in the smallest churches (both inside and often outside).

(See Part 2 | Part 3)

NOTES

[1] Zbigniew Herbert, Tamarisk, 1961.

^[2]Instruction on Sacred Music and Sacred Liturgy of the Sacred Congregation for Rites according to the guidelines of Pope Pius XII’s encyclicals Musicae Sacrae Disciplina and Mediator Dei of September 3, 1958. The role of the commentator may seem peculiar today, but it was someone who translated what the priest was doing and saying (in Latin) into the vernacular.

^[3] See, for example, the Polish Episcopate’s Instruction in connection with the publication of the new altar missal of March 11, 1987.

^[4] Marshall McLuhan, Liturgy and the Microphone. First published in: “The Critic” 1974, vol. 33, no. 1, October-December, pp. 12–17; reprinted in: Eric McLuhan and Jacek Szklarek (eds.), The medium and the light: Reflections on Religion, Toronto: Stoddart 1999, pp. 107-116, quote from p. 112.

^[5] Pierre Babin, (Marshall McLuhan’s) Third Conversation with Pierre Babin, in: Eric McLuhan and Jacek Szklarek (eds.), The Medium and the Light: Reflections on Religion, Toronto: Stoddart 1999, pp. 141-149, quote from p. 143.

^[6] It seems that the issues surrounding the microphone escaped even Marcel Lefebvre, the most vocal critic of the Mass reform, and even the Society of St. Pius X uses microphones in its chapels and churches.

^[7] Nico Fassino, Lift up thy voice with strength, handmissalhistory, October 10, 2022, https://handmissalhistory.com/feature-microphones/, September 25, 2025.

^[8] As an aside, let us ask ourselves how earlier councils were possible without microphones? If there had been no microphones, would the “progressive” faction have been audible enough to significantly change the preliminary documents?

^[9] “By 1945, Pope Pius XII regularly celebrated mass with four microphones installed on the high altar in St. Peter’s Basilica and even had two microphones on the altar in his private chapel.” [Nico Fassino, Lift up thy voice with strength, handmissalhistory, October 10, 2022, https://handmissalhistory.com/feature-microphones/, September 25, 2025]

^[10] Nico Fassino notes that, paradoxically, the microphone has led to the creation of “cry rooms” for children in American churches. If the words spoken by the priest are to be heard, other sounds, especially noisy children, must not interfere.

^[11] To understand what this is all about, it is enough to experience at least once a new Mass in a country where the language is so foreign that we are unable to distinguish individual words from the stream of speech (for me, these were Latvian and Finnish). During such a Mass, it is difficult not to ask yourself the question: “What am I doing here?”

^[12] The Basilica of Divine Mercy in Łagiewniki (Kraków, Poland), consecrated in 2002, elliptical in shape, the interior — covering approximately 5,000 square meters and accommodating around 5,000 worshippers.

The Gospel of Passion Monday

Yesterday, the Roman Rite began the season of Passiontide, in which the focus of the liturgy shifts from penance, fasting, and the preparation of the catechumens for baptism to meditation on the Lord’s impending suffering and death, before His glorious resurrection on Easter Sunday. The Mass chants of the season are mostly taken from Psalms which are evidently about the Passion, and were understood as such by the Fathers, as for example today’s introit, the beginning of Psalm 55: “Miserére mihi, Dómine, quoniam conculcávit me homo: tota die bellans tribulávit me. – Have mercy on me, o Lord, for a man hath trodden me down; all the day he hath made war and troubled me.” A treatise known as the Breviarium in Psalmos, traditionally but incorrectly attributed to St Jerome, which seems to have been read very closely by the unknown composers of many Gregorian chants, explains this verse as follows: “In the one who is a man and makes war, the Psalm shows the attack of the devil and of the other wicked spirits, at whose inspiration the Lord suffered.”

The Man of Sorrows, ca. 1434, by the German painter and Dominican friar Master Francke (ca. 1380- ca. 1440)

The epistle, however, is the third chapter of the book of Jonah, in which the prophet enters the city of Nineveh and preaches to the inhabitants the fast commanded by God as an act of repentance. Placed on this first feria of Passiontide, it serves as an important reminder that although the tenor of the liturgy has shifted, Passiontide is still very much a part of Lent, and Lent is kept by fasting.

The Gospel, John 7, 32-39, then explains in a very beautiful and subtle way what exactly the liturgy is now looking forward to, and not just in Passiontide, but in what comes from it, and extends beyond it through the Easter season. “The rulers and Pharisees sent ministers to apprehend him”: this foretells our Lord’s arrest in the garden of Gethsemane on the night of Holy Thursday. Jesus’ words to those sent to arrest Him, “Yet a little while I am with you, and then I go to him that sent me,” remind us that we are now very close to the day on which He will die, but also to the time of His Ascension, in which He will bring our human nature, glorified in the Passion and Resurrection, before the throne of God. “You shall seek me, and shall not find me, and where I am, thither you cannot come,” refers to the absence of the Lord’s body from the tomb. The response of the Jews to this, as they say, “Whither will he go, that we shall not find him? will He go unto the dispersed among the gentiles, and teach (them)?”, is a prophecy of Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit, through which the Lord will indeed, in the person of His Apostles, go among the gentiles and teach them.

The conclusion of the Gospel therefore speaks of the baptism of the catechumens both at the Easter vigil, and, according to the ancient tradition of the Church, at the vigil of Pentecost as well. On the latter, the Communio of the Mass is taken from this passage. “And on the last and great day of the festivity (here, symbolically, on the last day of Lent, i.e. Holy Saturday), Jesus stood and cried, saying, ‘If any man thirst, let him come to me, and drink. He that believeth in me, as the scripture saith, “Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” Now this He said of the Spirit which they should receive, who believed in him: for as yet the Spirit was not given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.”

Communio, Jo. 7 Ultimo festivitátis die dicébat Jesus, ‘Qui in me credit, flúmina de ventre ejus fluent aquae vivae’; hoc autem dixit de Spíritu, quem acceptúri erant credentes in eum, allelúja, allelúja. (On the last day of the feast, Jesus said, ‘He who believes in Me, from within him there shall flow rivers of living water.’ He said this, however, of the Spirit, Whom they who believed in Him were to receive, alleluia, alleluia.

The final verse reminds us, as we walk with the Lord in His sufferings, that He is indeed glorified at the end of them, not only in the Resurrection, but in the establishment of His Church, and the fulfillment of the mission which He gave to it to go forth and baptize all nations.

From the Friday of the third week of Lent to the last day of Passion week, most of the Roman Rite’s Gospel readings are taken from St John. They are, however, not arranged in the order of the Gospel itself.

• Week 3, Friday, John 4, 5-42 (the Samaritan Woman)
• Saturday, John 8, 1-11 (the adulteress)
• Fourth Sunday, John 6, 1-15 (the multiplication of loaves and fishes)
• Monday, John 2, 13-25 (the purging of the temple)
• Tuesday, John 7, 14-31 (the second part of Christ’s discourse in the temple during the feast of tabernacles)
• Wednesday, John 9, 1-38 (the healing of the blind man)
• Friday, John 11, 1-45 (the raising of the Lazarus)
• Saturday, John 8, 12-20 (“I am the light of the world.”)
• Passion Sunday, John 8, 46-59 (the discourse on Abraham)
• Monday, John 7, 32-39 (described above: the third part of Christ’s discourse in the temple during the feast of tabernacles)
• Tuesday, John 7, 1-13 (the first part of same)
• Wednesday, John 10, 22-38 (the discourse in the porch of the temple)
• Friday, John 11, 47-54 (the priests and pharisees take council against the Lord)
• Saturday, John 12, 10-36 (the triumphal entry into Jerusalem)

In the lectionary of the post-Conciliar Rite, not one of these remains in its traditional place. The Gospels of the Samaritan woman, the blind man and the raising of Lazarus have all been moved to Sundays in year A, on the basis of a completely erroneous belief, one that rests on no evidence of any kind, that their analogous position in the Ambrosian Rite attests their supposed original order in the Roman Rite. (Someone managed to realize that within the three-year lectionary system, that this means that these crucial passages are omitted from Lent altogether in two years out of three. A provision is therefore made that they can be resumed on any of the following ferias of the same week in such years, but this is not mandatory.) The rest have been rearranged as part of a semi-continuous series of readings from John which follows the order of the Gospel, but the selection of passages is very different, and no part of today’s reading remains in Lent on either a Sunday or a feria. The official description of the new lectionary claims that this new selection of readings “corresponds more fully to the characteristics of Lent.”

I imagine that many of our readers have read the proposal made by Geoffroy Kemlin, abbot of Solesmes, and sent to the Holy Father, recently published in an English translation on Rorate Caeli, that the Ordo missae of St Pius V be incorporated into the post-Conciliar missal, so that those who celebrate the traditional Roman Rite can benefit from all the worst features of the post-Conciliar Rite: the prefaces, eucharistic prayers and lectionary. In an interview that follows, Abbot Kemlin states that “the current lectionary called for by Vatican II is far richer than the old one.”

I pass over the fact that Vatican II most certainly did not call for the historical lectionary of the Roman Rite to be thrown in the trash and replaced with a new one of the Consilium ad exsequendam’s devising, although the good abbot of all people should know this. But to refer to the new lectionary as “richer” is an embarrassingly shallow assessment. Yes, it does have more readings. But as has been pointed out over and over again for nearly sixty years now, there is hardly a page of it that does not cheapen or substantially mispresent the meaning of the Word of God by censoring it of so-called difficult passages, or shortening it for the sake of mere convenience. (The Gospel of Lazarus, e.g., which was read this past Sunday, can optionally be cut down by omitting 18½ of its 45 verses, more than 40% of it. Next Sunday, the Passion of St Matthew can be optionally cut down to a pitiable 44 verses out of the traditional 141, a bit more than 30%.)

An unimportant part of the Lord’s Passion, depicted by the Italian painter Sebastiano Ricci (1659-1734), ca. 1730.

But there is the graver issue that the men who created the Roman Mass, including its lectionary, were poets and scholars of the very highest and finest literary sensibility, as evidenced, for example, by the careful selection of the Gospel reading for today, and the subtle way it lays out a program for the rest of Passiontide, and connects it to the Easter season. The notion that their work so desperately needed improving upon that almost no part of it should be left undisturbed would, in a happier age, rightly have been censured as scandalous and offensive to pious ears. The notion that the men who sat on the Consilium ad exsequendam were the ones to improve it is laughable. To paraphrase one of Evelyn Waugh’s best sayings, “To see this committee fumbling with our rich and delicate lectionary is to experience all the horror of seeing a Sèvres vase in the hands of a chimpanzee.”

I therefore offer as a counter-proposal that the lectionary of the post-Conciliar Rite be further enriched by the optional use of the Roman lectionary, so that the whole Church may benefit from the marvelous work of these ancient poets and scholars, our forefathers in the Faith, as Vatican II actually wanted.