Can a Bishop Restrict a “Private Mass” in the Usus Antiquior to a Priest and a Server?

In certain dioceses, Traditionis Custodes is being “applied” in ways that go well beyond what would be required by the letter of the law (such as it is; Fr. Réginald-Marie Rivoire in his masterful canonical tract has shown that it is bad law and worse theology; see also my article on newly-ordained priests and permission to offer the usus antiquior). One such way is when bishops attempt to redefine “private Mass” as a Mass at which only a priest and a server are present, and no one else.

Let’s begin with a preliminary canonical matter. If a bishop merely tells his priests that this will be his policy, or has it communicated to them in an informal way, then it is neither valid nor legally enforceable, the reason being given in a series of canons:

Can. 49. A singular precept is a decree which directly and legitimately enjoins a specific person or persons to do or omit something, especially in order to urge the observance of law.

Can. 51. A decree is to be issued in writing, with the reasons at least summarily expressed if it is a decision.

Can. 54. §1. A singular decree whose application is entrusted to an executor takes effect from the moment of execution; otherwise, from the moment it is made known to the person by the authority of the one who issued it. §2. To be enforced, a singular decree must be made known by a legitimate document according to the norm of law.

Can. 55. Without prejudice to the prescripts of cann. 37 and 51, when a very grave reason prevents the handing over of the written text of a decree, the decree is considered to have been made known if it is read to the person to whom it is destined in the presence of a notary or two witnesses. After a written record of what has occurred has been prepared, all those present must sign it.

What is to be gathered from these canons is that the bishop would have had to present such a limitation on the rights of a priest in writing and properly promulgate it. If a bishop intends to ban something that a priest is otherwise entitled to, he must issue it in writing, because it has to be the sort of thing capable of being challenged by those affected by it. Otherwise, it would just be a form of bullying: “You gotta do this because I say so,” with no paper trail. Now, in the case at hand (where a bishop attempts to redefine a private Mass), what right of a priest would be being infringed?

Can. 906. Except for a just and reasonable cause, a priest is not to celebrate the Eucharistic sacrifice without the participation of at least some member of the faithful.

Note that Can. 906 normally requires that there be “at least some member of the faithful,” which is deliberately open-ended: it could logically and legally include several people, indeed it could include a large church packed to the rafters. This remains true for a Mass that an unimpeded priest offers on any day of the week in any legitimate place for any legitimate reason. That would include a Mass held, for appropriate reason, in a side chapel, at a school or a retreat center, in a rectory chapel, at a house, etc.

Now, Pope John XXIII in the 1960 Code of Rubrics, n. 269 (and after him, Paul VI in the encyclical Mysterium Fidei, nn. 32–33) rejected the term “private Mass” because a Mass of its very nature is a social act—even when said by a priest with a server and no one else. Historically and juridically, a “Missa privata” meant a Mass “deprived” of solemnity or ceremonial—a low Mass at a side altar in contrast with a solemn conventual Mass. Only later and colloquially did it acquire the sense of “unofficial, unscheduled, unadvertised.” Nevertheless, we can reasonably describe a Mass that is said on private property (not in a diocesan property) and not advertised to the public, and without pomp and circumstance, as a “private Mass.”[1] There is no canonical rule against doing this, nor, for the reasons given, could a merely verbal instruction from a bishop suffice.

(Let us be clear about this point: Any implementation of Traditionis Custodes that is not formally committed to writing in such a way that it might be canonically evaluated and challenged is invalid on the face of it and cannot be enforced.)

It is arbitrary to limit servers to a single one. There is no canonical basis for such a limit. A priest could have one, two, or three servers, or as many as seemed conveniens. Similarly, it is arbitrary to specify that a server can be present but not, say, three lay people who are simply attending and praying. Unless the server is ordained to the minor order of acolyte or installed in the “ministry” of acolyte, the server is simply a layman wearing a cassock and surplice and offering some assistance. There would be no objective basis for the aforementioned limit. Indeed, since the very term “private Mass” is to be avoided as per the 1960 Code of Rubrics (n. 269), one might consider any policy couched in terms of “private Mass” to be theologically unsound, and therefore deserving to be ignored.

Prior to 1958, the term “missa privata,” when used by the Holy See, carried with it various valences of meaning: conditions of privacy, lack of solemnity or music, etc.[2] I can only assume that a bishop today might use it in the sense of Mass “sine populo,” as the distinction exists in the Novus Ordo texts.[3] This concept does not, however, exist for the usus antiquior, and is therefore inapplicable.

Since current legislation does not define “private Mass,” a bishop could argue that it’s up to him to make distinctions (using the oft misquoted notion of the bishop as the “chief liturgist” of his diocese), though the counter-argument would be that such distinctions are praeter legem and beyond the authority of the bishop. A bishop who prohibits the Old Mass simply needs to be resisted. Priests should continue to offer the Mass. If need be, state that “Father will be offering a private Mass at 8:30 a.m. in the school chapel. The doors of the chapel will be unlocked during this private offering of the Mass.”

Incidentally, if a bishop dared to prohibit priests from saying the TLM by themselves, their prohibition would be utterly null and void. Pursuant to Can. 906 (and this is a change from Can. 813 in the 1917 Code), a priest is permitted to celebrate Mass without a server or anyone else for a “just and reasonable cause.”[4] This has long been understood canonically to include simply the great good, for himself and for the Church, of the priest saying daily Mass.

Thus, taking all the forgoing into consideration, hypothetically in a diocese where a bishop attempted to limit “private Masses” to a priest and one server, it would be permissible for a priest to celebrate a Missa sine populo without a server (i.e., a Missa solitaria) for a “just cause” as per Can. 906 (what more just cause than pursuing sanctity and the honoring of God according to the sound ritual tradition of the Church?), but in such a way that some of the faithful happened to be there at the same time for an unrelated reason (say, for instance, they gathered to pray the Rosary). In this case, everything would be canonically correct and the bishop’s ruling—already incorrect for other reasons—would not even find matter to which it could apply.


NOTES

[1] O’Connell lists several kinds of private Masses.

[2] Cf. McManus, Handbook for the New Rubrics (Baltimore: Helicon, 1960), 106.

[3] “The revised edition of the Roman Missal that was promulgated by Pope Paul VI in 1969 presented two forms of the Order of Mass: Ordo Missae cum populo and Ordo Missae sine populo…. The 1970 General Instruction of the Roman Missal dealt with the first of these forms of celebrating Mass under the numbers 77–152, and with the second under the numbers 209–231. The latter section began with the explanation: ‘This section gives the norms for Mass celebrated by a priest with only one server to assist him and to make the responses.’ In the revised and expanded 2002 edition of the General Instruction, the term Missa cum populo remains as the heading for the information given under numbers 115–198, but the other section (numbers 252–272) speaks of Missa cuius unus tantum minister participat (Mass in which only one server participates). Corresponding to the latter form, the Missal presents the Ordo Missae cuius unus tantum minister participat (Order of Mass in which only one server participates)” (source).

[4] Fr Zuhlsdorf has a bit more on that here: https://wdtprs.com/2016/12/ask-father-can-priests-say-the-tridentine-mass-alone-without-a-server/.

Three Nostalgia Trips: Audio Albums from 1957, 1975 (?), and 1979

It seems as if advocates of eliminating the Catholic Church’s liturgical tradition often try to explain away the surprisingly dogged adherence to older forms as a matter of “nostalgia”—even today, when the average age of many Latin Mass congregations cannot be much higher than about 18 thanks to the enormous number of babies. It is hard for them to understand that the older forms have a holy eloquence of their own, an effiacious communicative capacity, that has almost nothing to do with the age or past experiences of the ones who attend.

But one might feel a bit of genuine nostalgia looking at these three LPs that have come my way in recent times.

The first was discovered by a priest when cleaning out his parents’ house. Today there are websites on which one can practice making the responses at Mass, but back in the day, in 1957 to be precise, you could pick up an old 45 called The Mass: Serving and Responses: Latin Responses for Altar Boys and for First Level Participation in Dialogue Mass, with an imprimatur from Cardinal Stritch. Quite the time capsule of 1957.
 

The second is a rather revealing slice of history: Latin High Mass for Nostalgic Catholics, which was produced by World Library of Sacred Music in Cincinnati. There is no date, but I’m guessing, on the basis of the description on the back, that it would have come out around 1975. The cover shows scenes taken from Fr. Lasance. It features a recording of the traditional Nuptial Mass, with Casali’s Mass in G, Schubert’s Ave Maria, Franck’s Panis Angelicus, and Widor’s Toccata from the 5^th organ symphony. The celebrant is a certain Rev. Cronan Kline, OFM, and the director of the choir is, interestingly, Omar Westendorf, whose hymns show up in many a hymnal.
 

What I find especially noteworthy, and rather sad, is the justification the record offers for itself:
 

The third exhibit is something of an oddity from 1979: Lieder des Papstes Johannes Paul II in Polen. The pinkish halo surrounding the Polish pope seems already to anticipate his accelerated canonization—that seems a better interpretation than radioactivity or phosphorescence.
 

The music is all sung in Polish, of course, but the album is designed for Germans, so it offers (according to a tiny note) a word-for-word literal translation of the various folksongs and specially composed offerings for the Polish pope on his momentous return trip to his homeland, from which many date the beginning of the end of Communism in Eastern Europe.
 

 

If I were to say “Ah, those were the days!,” I would be telling a lie, since I was exactly –14, 4, and 8 years old at the time these discs were manufactured. No, they hold no nostalgic value for me, but they do prompt some thoughts. Lots of little boys are still learning and making the responses at Mass, in spite of the attempt, some twelve years after the 45’s release, to cancel out the Latin Mass forever. Second, chant, choral music, and organ music of a far higher caliber than that which is found on the Westendorf record can be heard today at actual High Masses and Solemn High Masses around the world, in spite of renewed barbarian aggression against the Latin Mass. Third, whatever one might say about John Paul II’s weaker moments, he is in fact glowing in comparison with what Providence has allowed us to suffer in the past decade.

New Book Defends All-Male Liturgical Ministry, Subdiaconate/Minor Orders, and Proper Roles of Clergy and Laity

I am pleased to announce the release of my latest book, Ministers of Christ: Recovering the Roles of Clergy and Laity in an Age of Confusion (Crisis Publications).

When this project was first conceived over a year ago, my initial idea was to write a critique of Paul VI’s attempted suppression of the subdiaconate and minor orders, of John Paul II’s permission of altar girls, and of Francis’s innovation of female “acolytes” and “lectors.” During its writing, however, the scope of the book considerably broadened to include a full-scale presentation and defense of the traditional sevenfold manifestation of Orders — priest, deacon, subdeacon, lector, acolyte, exorcist, and porter — together with an explanation of the distinct but mutually supporting roles of clergy and laity. In order to accomplish this, I stepped back further to look at the distinction and complementarity of the sexes in the order of creation and the order of redemption, a perspective that provides the ultimate foundation for the Church’s entire teaching on states of life, roles, and ministries. In this way the book serves as a response to the “gender madness” that afflicts the world and increasingly infects the Church.

The summer’s anti-TLM motu proprio Traditionis Custodes and the mounting threats against the former Ecclesia Dei institutes that avail themselves of the traditional rites of ordination conspire to make the book’s overall argument more urgent still. (Fortunately, subsequent to July 16 I was given the opportunity to do some last-minute revisions to the text in order to take this new scenario into account. Nothing of substance had to be changed in the overall argument.)

Ministers of Christ analyzes the problems with recent popes’ successive innovations in the area of ministry, showing how they have created a theologically and liturgically incoherent situation—a categorical rupture from a tradition firmly rooted in the most profound anthropological, Christological, and ecclesiological principles. In this regard the Church stands in desperate need of the correct (and corrective) witness of the usus antiquior. This will remain true even if a tyrannical attempt is made to prohibit the ancient rites of ordination, an act that would have no more legal validity than Traditionis Custodes itself.

Part I, “Foundations,” looks at the most fundamental questions: how sexuality and the body have personal significance and therefore moral, theological, and liturgical significance as well; the connection between the Incarnation of Our Lord and the male priesthood and male sanctuary service; the blessing on womanhood conferred in and through Our Lady, the Virgin Mother of God; the Old Testament background and New Testament roots of the diaconate, subdiaconate, and minor orders, seen as radiating outward from the priesthood of Jesus Christ, and the solemn tradition behind this ecclesiastical hierarchy; and the proper role of the laity in the great world outside the churches, where they exercise their primary responsibilities.

Part II, “Deviations,” takes a critical look at practices that entered the Church after the Second Vatican Council—above all, the attempt to sideline the subdiaconate and minor orders and the habitual use of female lectors and altar servers, whether filling in as “substitutes” or, as Pope Francis would have it, installed as ministers. It explains how these distortions and novelties misconstrue and muddle the callings of laity and clergy as well as their diverse but complementary modes of participation in the liturgy. In the course of the chapters, the notion of “active participation” is freed from its harsh captivity as a slogan trafficked by modern liturgists.

Part III, “Restoration,” charts a path out of this mess into a healthier church life, making the case for several related proposals:

– the universal reestablishment of the subdiaconate and minor orders, which have never been and cannot be abrogated and which remain in use to this day;

– a return to the traditional lex orandi of the classical Roman rite, which embodies true doctrine about states of life, ministries, and sexes;

– the wearing of veils by women in church as a sign of their dignity and role within the Mystical Body;

– the full acceptance of the supernatural and sacrificial vision of priesthood and consecrated life that attracts vocations today as it always did in the past, together with a firm repudiation of the “heresy of activism” that extinguishes the primacy of prayer and the ultimacy of contemplation;

– a reversal of the mad race of aggiornamento, to be replaced by the serene embrace of the essential changelessness of the Christian religion, which worships the immutable God in His eternal truth, reflected in traditional liturgical rites.

This book also includes the definitive versions of two essays by Bishop Athanasius Schneider: “The Significance of Minor Ministries in the Sacred Liturgy” and “Healing the Rupture: A Call for the Restoration of Minor Orders.”

Ministers of Christ concludes with three litanies for private devotional use. The first is for the clergy in general. The second and third, based on the Roman Martyrology, remind us that the Church’s history provides many examples of saintly subdeacons, lectors, acolytes, and exorcists whom we ought to invoke. Lastly, there is a select bibliography divided into topics.

Ministers of Christ: Recovering the Roles of Clergy and Laity in an Age of Confusion.
   By Peter Kwasniewski, with two chapters by Bishop Athanasius Schneider.
   Foreword by Leila Marie Lawler.
   Manchester, NH: Crisis Publications, 2021.
   xliii + 285 pp.
   Paperback $19.95.

Available directly from the publisher or from Amazon.com.

Here is a short video (by no means professional...) that has more or less the same content as the post above, for those who prefer the video format.

Latin Responses Webinar, October 5–30

Beginning October 5, Mr Louis Tofari of Romanitas Press will conduct a 4-week curriculum of live Zoom sessions for boys and men to learn the Latin responses in the traditional Mass. This uniquely integrated course will include a review of:

• liturgical Latin and its basics of pronunciation;
• the significance of the prayers said by the servers;
• important background information about the Preparatory Prayers, psalms and their structure, Psalm 42, the saints invoked in the Confiteor, etc.;
• an explanation and practice of the associated gestures and reverences (folded hands, signs of the cross, bowing, striking the breast); and
• homework exercises.

The curriculum will be hosted on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings for a total of 12 sessions. Each session will run 45 minutes, starting at or shortly after 11:00am EST. The cost is for the entire course is $90 per participant, plus the required materials ($8.25 total); special group pricing is available if two or more participants will be viewing from the same device.

For more information and to subscribe to the webinar, click HERE.

For samples of the material to be presented, click HERE and HERE.

Traditional Latin Mass Server Quarantine Workout

This very funny video has been making the rounds on social media... a great way to stay healthy, and stay in practice for serving at Mass once the churches reopen, quod Deus celeriter praestet!

Restoring Liturgical Tradition after the Pandemic

Even as Catholics continue to suffer from the difficult situation in which we find ourselves, with an absence of public liturgies and restricted sacramental access, the virtue of supernatural hope already prompts us to see many ways in which God may bring forth great good from this evil — or, to speak more truthfully, may be calling us to collaborate in bringing forth great good by a prudent response to circumstances. In particular, we can envision several ways in which the liturgical life of the Church could be improved by far-seeing pastors.

1. Increase frequency of private TLMs. With a large number of priests now consigned to the private celebration of Mass (which is legitimate and praiseworthy according to the mind of the Church), priests will be free to offer the traditional Latin Mass on a daily basis. For priests relatively new at it, this makes possible the perfecting of the celebration through frequent practice. For priests who have been wanting to learn it, now would be a God-sent opportunity to put in the time and practice necessary. For all priests, it could be viewed as an enforced “retreat” at which they can pray freely and fervently for the needs of the Church and the world.

2. Offer Masses ad orientem. Even priests who are not offering or not planning to offer Mass in its traditional form can begin to offer their Masses ad orientem, as is just and right. After several weeks (potentially) of saying Mass facing geographical or liturgical east, these priests will have a perfect excuse to say to their congregations: “In these weeks of the pandemic, when I have been praying Mass for you and your needs every day, I have grown accustomed to offering it facing east, in accord with the long tradition of the Church. I have discovered how much more prayerful it is, how it enables me to pray more fervently to God and for all the intentions for which the Mass is offered. As a result, I would like to keep doing this now that our public celebrations are permitted again.”

With the chaos of paperwork and re-planning that will be engulfing chanceries everywhere, and the sheer gratitude of the faithful who will have returned to church, there could never be a more opportune moment to introduce ad orientem. A simple explanation will put it in context, and Catholic life will go on — only better than it was before.

3. Enrich or tweak the parish Mass schedule. When the public Mass schedule is re-announced, priests will have an ideal opportunity to add to the parish schedule a TLM if it has not been present before, or shift around times to give the TLM a better time slot, or add more TLMs during the week or month. Again, this expansion of sacramental access will be appreciated on its own terms after a long period of instability and inaccessibility, and the Catholics who come back will be prepared for new terrain.

4. Abolish bad custom and abuse. Dubious liturgical customs and liturgical abuses, which have already de facto come to an end with the coronavirus shutdown, could be stopped indefinitely. This has been proposed by an anonymous priest who noted that, even after bishops had banned the sign of peace, holding hands during the Lord’s Prayer, and Communion from the chalice, the Mass still went on and people still attended. In other words, the faithful — or at least the most faithful of the faithful — are more interested in going to Mass than they are in shaking hands, holding hands, or receiving “the cup.” It is more important to go to Mass, period, than to “get” to be an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion. Now is a truly God-given moment to start afresh with better customs:

• discontinuation of the multiplication of chalices for distributing the Precious Blood (with all the problems this creates);
• discontinuation of the habitual use of extraordinary lay ministers, as per the constant instructions (hitherto always ignored) of the Holy See;
• discontinuation of the use of female altar servers in favor of well-trained male altar servers;
• discontinuation of the distracting and theological incoherent “sign (or kiss) of peace” as practiced in the Novus Ordo;
• encouragement of kneeling for Holy Communion — which could be encouraged still further by the installation of a communion rail during this down time;
• exclusion of the laity handling or washing the sacred vessels of the altar, whether during the liturgy or before or after it.

Together with “turning over a new leaf,” priests can preach about:

• the fullness of Christ’s presence under each species — thereby defending the traditional reception of the host alone;
• the essential difference between the ordained priesthood and the common priesthood of the faithful, and thus, why it is appropriate for only the clergy to distribute Communion;
• why Communion in the hand was a mistake (not, as some try to argue, the revival of ancient practice) that we have many reasons to regret, and why it is best to follow the tradition of the Church, reaffirmed by Paul VI, of receiving on the tongue while kneeling — a posture not only palpably reverent and hallowed by centuries of Catholic custom, but also more efficient and convenient for the minister who is distributing the hosts.

5. Rework the parish music program. Choirs will have been disbanded for weeks. It would therefore be an opportune moment for reassigning responsibilities. A newly-formed schola that sings Gregorian chant could be assigned to a Mass to provide truly sacred music. Another group might be allowed to remain disbanded because of “new pastoral exigencies and priorities.”

It may seem strange to be thinking ahead when we don’t even know what each new day will bring, but we must follow Our Lord’s advice to be “wise as serpents and simple as doves” (Mt 10:16) as we reconquer lost territory for the Kingdom of God. The Lord is gesturing at rich harvests to be reaped. Let us put our hands to the plough and not look back (cf. Lk 9:62).

All of us are being stretched by Divine Providence, so let’s take advantage of the newfound elasticity!

Visit Dr. Kwasniewski’s website, SoundCloud page, and YouTube videos.

Two Modest Proposals for Improving the Prayerfulness of Low Mass

With the increasing number of Masses offered in the usus antiquior, it is fair to say that Catholics are experiencing some of the same problems that were pointed to as reasons for the liturgical reform prior to the Council. While the list of such problems is lengthy, none of them in fact justified the liturgical reform as it actually played out. Nevertheless one would hope that the traditional movement could learn from past mistakes and make a special effort to avoid the same in the current fraught ecclesiastical situation. Since the manner of carrying out the Mass redounds immediately to either the edification and devotion of the priest and people or to their distraction and frustration, it behooves us to take it seriously. For indeed, nothing could be more serious than the sacramental re-presentation of the Sacrifice of the Cross.

In this article I will look at two of the most common problems: nearly inaudible, inarticulate muttering of servers at Low Mass, and rapid-fire delivery of the Latin prayers by the priest, as if he were in a race against time.

The Dialogue Between Priest and Servers

While it would be ideal to have liturgy served by clerics in minor orders, religious brothers, or seminarians, most of the time, as we know, Catholics have recourse to “altar boys” filling in for acolytes. And I have no complaint about the institution of altar boys as such, provided they are tall enough and serious enough to fulfill their functions in the sanctuary.

However, as we learn from the High Mass, which is the real template of the Low Mass, the servers are making responses on behalf of the entire body of the faithful. At High Mass, we all sing “Et cum spiritu tuo,” and at Low Mass (I am purposefully not discussing the dialogue Mass in this article) the servers speak the same words in our place. Moreover, as the Roman Rite has developed, the preparatory prayers or prayers at the foot of the altar have ceased to be purely private prayers for the priest and ministers; they have come to belong to the faithful, too, who treasure them, follow them in their missals or from memory, and wish to hear them at Low Mass. As if in tacit acknowledgment of this fact, nearly all of the priests whose Masses I have heard over the past 30 years utter Psalm 42 and the additional prayers prior to the “Aufer a nobis” with a level of voice that can readily be heard throughout the church.

It is therefore asymmetrical and irritating when the servers mumble, swallow, or whisper their responses to the priest’s well-articulated phrases. It is the liturgical equivalent to someone walking with one normal leg and one peg-leg. Here is how it comes across to the faithful in the pews:

Priest. In nómine Patris, et Fílii, + et Spíritus Sancti. Amen. Introíbo ad altáre Dei. 
Servers. Ad Deum qui lætíficat juventútem meam.
P. Júdica me, Deus, et discérne causam meam de gente non sancta: ab hómine iníquo, et dolóso érue me.
S. Quia tu es, Deus, fortitúdo mea: quare me repulísti, et quare tristis incédo, dum afflígit me inimícus?
P. Emítte lucem tuam, et veritátem tuam: ipsa me deduxérunt, et aduxérunt in montem sanctum tuum, et in tabernácula tua.
S. Et introíbo ad altáre Dei: ad Deum qui lætíficat juventútem meam.
P. Confitébor tibi in cíthara, Deus, Deus meus: quare tristis es, ánima mea, et quare contúrbas me?
S. Spera in Deo, quóniam adhuc confitébor illi: salutáre vultus mei, et Deus meus.
P. Glória Patri, et Fílio, et Spirítui Sancto.
S. Sicut erat in princípio et nunc, et semper, et in sæcula sæculórum. Amen.
P. Introíbo ad altáre Dei.
S. Ad Deum qui lætíficat juventútem meam.
P. Adjutórium nostrum + in nómine Dómini.
S. Qui fecit cælum et terram.

And so forth, throughout the liturgy. The dialogue is often so unequal that the priest might as well be the only one speaking, in a bizarre vivisected conversation, somewhat like overhearing a telephone call. If the servers are representing us at the foot of the altar, they are doing a poor job of it. Why don’t they speak up a bit — “enunciate and articulate!,” as my high school rhetoric teacher used to say? Again, this is not about using a loud voice. It is simply about using a normal audible voice and not rushing through the words. They are, after all, prayers, and prayers are worth praying. Deo gratias after the Epistle should sound like it means “Thanks be to God!,” and the same with Laus tibi, Christe.

Am I asking too much of these cute and sometimes clueless boys? No. I believe that those who train altar boys should teach them what the words mean, and teach them how to enunciate them and articulate them at a normal volume and a walking, not running, pace. Not:

P. Kyrie eleison.
S. Kyrie eleison.
P. Kyrie eleison.
S. Christe eleison.
P. Christe eleison.
S. Christe eleison.
P. Kyrie eleison.
S. Kyrie eleison.
P. Kyrie eleison.

Above all, at the end of the Offertory, these words should be distinct and audible at Low Mass:

Suscípiat Dóminus sacrifícium de mánibus tuis ad laudem et glóriam nóminis sui, ad utilitátem quoque nostram, totiúsque Ecclésiæ suæ sanctæ.

And moving into the Preface dialogue, it is totally unfitting to hear the following:

P. …per omnia saecula saeculorum.
S. Amen.
P. Dóminus vobíscum.
S. Et cum spíritu tuo.
P. Sursum corda.
S. Habémus ad Dóminum.
P. Grátias agámus Dómino Deo nostro.
S. Dignum et justum est.

The priest is inviting us, in one of the most beautiful phrases of the Roman liturgy, to “Lift your hearts on high!,” and the response should be in earnest: “We have lifted [them] up to the Lord!” Then, in a phrase rich with Eucharistic meaning: “Let us give thanks unto the Lord our God.” To which the response must be equally meaningful, as if the servers are senators speaking for a holy nation: “It is worthy and just.” These are not phrases to be rattled off under one’s breath; they are to be sounded forth in public.

The inaudibility of the servers, the disharmony it creates with the priest, and the lack of “purchase” it offers the congregation are matters that deserve to be taken seriously by the adult trainers who prepare the servers and the MCs who regulate the teams. This is not a difficult problem to correct, but it does require awareness, attentiveness, and follow-through, together with positive reinforcement (“Johnny, it was great how you spoke your responses so clearly today. Keep it up!”)

Haste in Clerical Recitation of Texts

A related matter of concern is the post-Summorum reappearance of clergy who habitually rush through the Low Mass. As far as I can tell, we are dealing in most cases with genuinely devout men who intend no disrespect to Our Lord and no disedification to the faithful. Nevertheless, machine-gun Latin —

Paternoster,quiesincælis:Sanctificéturnomentuum:Advéniatregnumtuum:Fiatvolúntastua,sicutincælo,etinterra.Panemnostrumquotidiánumdanobishódie:Etdimíttenobisdébitanostra,sicutetnosdimíttimusdebitóribusnostris.Etnenosindúcasintentatiónem.

AgnusDei,quitollispeccátamundi:miserérenobis.AgnusDei,quitollispeccátamundi:miserérenobis.AgnusDei,quitollispeccátamundi:donanobispacem.

Dómine,nonsumdignus,utintressubtectummeum:sedtantumdicverbo,etsanábituránimamea.Dómine,nonsumdignus,utintressubtectummeum:sedtantumdicverbo,etsanábituránimamea.Dómine,nonsumdignus,utintressubtectummeum:sedtantumdicverbo,etsanábituránimamea.

— does not carry any conviction of being speech truly addressed to the face of a living Person with whom one is communicating, as two friends would talk to one another, nor, for this reason, can it in fact increase the devotion of the speaker or of the listeners. It seems, on the contrary, to be a lost opportunity on the part of both priest and people for the intensification of acts of adoration, faith, humility, contrition, and other virtues. In spite of the daily repetition of the Mass, we could truthfully apply to its celebration the familiar words of the Quaker who said: “I shall pass this way but once; any good that I can do or any kindness I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.” This particular Mass will never be repeated, nor will this particular congregation assist at it. And as we know from the dogmatic theologians, the subjective devotion of the priest and of the people have a role to play in the spiritual fruitfulness of the Mass.

Perhaps the most germane statement made on this subject is St Francis de Sales’s: “Beware of it [haste], for it is a deadly enemy of true devotion; and anything done with precipitation is never done well. Let us go slowly, for if we do but keep advancing we shall thus go far.”

Dom Chautard, author of The Soul of the Apostolate — one of the few truly essential spiritual books written in the past century — has a lot to say on this subject. The author spends several pages unpacking the meaning of the prayer said before the Divine Office, in which the cleric asks for the grace to recite it digne, attente, devote, worthily, attentively, devoutly:

DIGNE. A respectful position and bearing, the precise pronunciation of the words, slowing down over the more important parts. Careful observance of the rubrics. My tone of voice, the way in which I make signs of the Cross, genuflections, etc.; my body itself: all will go to show not only that I know Whom I am addressing, and what I am saying, but also that my heart is in what I am doing. What an apostolate I can sometimes exercise [this way]! …

DEVOTE. This is the most important point. Everything comes back to the need of making our Office and all our liturgical functions acts of piety, and, consequently, acts that come from the heart. “Haste kills all devotion.” Such is the principle laid down by St. Francis de Sales in talking of the Breviary, and it applies a fortiori to the Mass, Hence. I shall make it a hard and fast rule to devote around half an hour to my Mass in order to ensure a devout recitation not only of the Canon but of all the other parts as well. I shall reject without pity all pretexts for getting through this, the principal act of my day, in a hurry. If I have the habit of mutilating certain words or ceremonies, I shall apply myself, and go over these faulty places very slowly and carefully, even exaggerating my exactitude for a while.
          Fill my heart with detestation for all haste in those things where I stand in Your place, or act in the name of the Church! Fill me with the conviction that haste paralyzes that great Sacramental, the Liturgy, and makes impossible that spirit of prayer without which, no matter how zealous a priest I may appear to be on the outside, I would be lukewarm, or perhaps worse, in Your estimation. Burn into my inmost heart those words so full of terror: “Cursed be he that doth the work of God deceitfully” (Jer 48:10).

Another classic text, The Hidden Treasure by Saint Leonard of Port Maurice, counsels the priest in the following words:

Use all diligence to celebrate with the utmost modesty, recollection, and care, taking time to pronounce well and distinctly every word, and perfectly to fulfill every ceremony with due propriety and gravity; for words ill articulated, or spoken without a tone of meekness and awe, and ceremonies done without decorum and accuracy, render the divine service, instead of a help to piety and religion, a source of distress and scandal. Let the priest keep the inner man devoutly recollected; let him think of the sense of all the words which he articulates, dwelling on their sense and spirit, and making throughout internal efforts corresponding to their holy suggestions. Then truly will there be an influx of great devotion into those assisting, and he will obtain the utmost profit for his own soul.

There is no question that a reverent Low Mass Mass can be offered in 30 minutes by a priest whose Latin flows well, who is extremely adept at the ceremonies, and who knows many of the prayers by heart. It is also true that sometimes Low Mass takes longer than it should because the celebrant is still learning the ropes and has not yet “mastered” the liturgical form. But regardless of the total duration, any appearance of rushing in words or gestures is never edifying and always detracts from the dignity and beauty of the celebration — and consequently from the prayerfulness it is meant to induce as well as the spiritual fruit likely to be derived from it.

Little things make a difference in the spiritual life; why would it not be the same in the greatest act of worship we can offer to God, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass? For a long time Catholics have fought simply to have access to the old Mass, an immense reservoir of grace, doctrine, and godly piety. We should not stop fighting for that access if we do not yet enjoy it, but now that we are some years down the road from the Mass’s reintroduction on a wider scale, it is time to correct the bad habits into which we may have inadvertently slid.

Some may be wondering: Can we possibly concern ourselves with such matters when the Church on earth seems to be falling apart in front of our very eyes? My view, however, is quite the opposite. This crisis we are living is a crisis of worldliness, of lukewarmness, infidelity, and apostasy. The ultimate solution to it is not investigations (however necessary), proclamations of doom and hand-wringing (however correct and satisfying), or a flurry of activism (however tempting). The solution begins and ends with drawing near to the Father and joining with the citizens of the fatherland. Now is the very best time to attend to the service of Almighty God in His holy sanctuary and to do what is right, because it is right, for the love and glory of God.

The Beginnings of a Serving Tradition: St Mary’s 11 Years Later

The arrival and passing of October has become a yearly reminder of how the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite became such an important part of St Mary’s Parish in Norwalk, Connecticut. Now known as a keystone parish in the restoration of the sacred to the liturgy, the seeds of that notoriety began in the damp and cold of October, 2007.

The Rev. Greg Markey, pastor of St Mary’s at the time, had learned the traditional form of the Roman Rite in 2001, and celebrated the Mass regularly for the St Gregory Society of New Haven, which sponsored the services at Sacred Heart Church. Fr Markey, who became pastor of St Mary’s in 2004, had been moving the regular liturgy toward a more traditional style, celebrating the Novus Ordo in Latin, using the high altar on regular occasions, and moving the music program away from Glory and Praise and into plainsong and the choral masters.

When Summorum Pontificum was promulgated on the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross that year, he determined he would more towards having a regular high mass. One of the first things he knew he had to do was train his servers.

Sacred Heart Church, New Haven, was the location for the traditional rites until it closed in September of 2009.

Fr. Markey had moved away from coed servers and toward an all-male group. As happens in most places where this is tried, the numbers increased, and he had close to 40 young men and boys who served weekly.

On Tuesday evenings in October, about 25 of those boys and young men trekked to the basement of St Patrick’s Chapel to begin learning the prayers and responses of the Traditional Mass. This writer was asked to do the training. For five consecutive Tuesdays and for several rehearsals after that, the boys learned by repetition the responses for mass.

There was a problem: None had ever seen the traditional rite, and many had no idea what it was. Out of loyalty to their pastor, the boys, along with Deacon Stephan Genovese, learned the “Prayers at the Foot of the Altar,” the versicles and responses, the “Suscipiat” and the various other things they were expected to be ready to say. Still, this was done without them understanding where, when or why they would make these responses.

But Fr. Markey had a plan. He was scheduled to sing the Mass and Benediction for the Feast of Christ the King at Sacred Heart in New Haven on the last Sunday of the month. This was going to be his opportunity to bring the boys down and have them take part in the service. The feast was and is still a big one for the St Gregory Society, and included Solemn Mass, exposition, Litany of the Sacred Heart, Act of Reparation and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament. 

The boys were going to get a dose of the ancient rite and traditional devotion they could never imagine.

We attempted some “walk-throughs” at St Mary’s, but attempting to show liturgical choreography to a group that had never seen the rite had its pitfalls. We did a rehearsal the day of the Mass when a caravan of automobiles from Norwalk traveled the 35 miles north to New Haven. What we did that day was have the Norwalk boys “shadow” the regular servers. The thurifer and his shadow stood side-by-side. The acolytes shadowed. Instead of two acolytes there were four. The torch-bearers had the six required, and another six kneeling right behind. It was a way to have them see, up close, the liturgy and what was required.

It worked. The kids were flawless, interested, and finally understood the position of the prayers they learned in relation to the liturgical action, and they were awed by the sights and smells, and the sounds of a polyphonic choir in the context of the rite. It all came together for them. Afterwards, there was a trip to downtown New Haven to pizza restaurants which is famous throughout the world.

Eventually, the ancient rite was added to St Mary’s regular schedule, and that group of servers continued to learn and perfect their roles.

St Mary’s is now one of the leading parishes in the country, offering both forms of the Roman Rite. The church now boast close to 60 servers, most of which are seen during the Sunday High Mass.

Some 11 years later and two pastors removed, we are now in the fourth generation of servers. Many of that original group, now in their 20s and pushing 30, are faithful to the parish. Some have discerned vocations and are studying for religious orders or the secular priesthood. They all agree that learning the traditional rite of Mass was a pivotal moment in their lives, and helped them understand more fully the doctrines they had been taught.

As with any large group of boys, the older guys teach the younger. They also act as sergeants-at-arms if the boys get too rambunctious. The progress through their roles from closing the gates or ringing the tower bells to more involved roles as they get older. 

Under the tutelage of Master of Ceremonies John Pia, one of the best students of the traditional rites on the planet, the worship at St Mary’s has become a template for others who are just beginning. His work with the servers since he arrived in January 2008 has molded the corps into a cohesive unit, but also taught the young men lessons they could scarcely learn elsewhere: teamwork, responsibility, and precision -- all for the greater Glory of God.

With the guidance first of Fr Markey, then Fr Richard Cipolla, and now the newly installed pastor, the Rev. John Ringley, St Mary’s now boasts a unit of servers that nears 60, ranging from eight to 24. Lifelong friendships have been forged here. Lifelong lessons have been learned here. Lifelong love of the Faith has been nurtured here. It’s a traditional part of a bigger tradition.

And it all started on a damp cold night in October eleven years ago.

Doctrinal Foundations of All-Male Sanctuary Service and the Problem with Ignoring Them

In the Temple of Jerusalem, the Holy of Holies was a place solemnly set apart, separated from the rest of the temple and its surrounding courtyards, on account of the mystery contained within it: the presence of God above the mercy seat, in the midst of the physical reminder of the covenant in blood. Out of fear and reverence for the Lord, lay men and women, lower ranks of priests and Levites, would not dare to enter the Holy of Holies. Only the high priest could enter, under precise conditions, ready to offer to the Lord his own prayers and the prayers of all the people.

Jesus Christ, our great High Priest, has pierced the veil and entered into the true tabernacle not made with human hands, preparing for us a way to follow Him into beatitude — even preparing for us, in this mortal life, a mystical banquet of His precious Body and Blood, so that we may be made sharers of the food of immortality. Yet, for all this intimacy of communion, He remains no less the Sovereign High Priest, crowned with glory, and we are no less His lowly servants in via. As we walk in pilgrimage towards the heavenly temple, there is still the distinction in kind between sacred and profane, baptized and unbaptized, the holy and the sinful, as well as the distinction of offices between ministers and laymen.

Far from being cut off from its ancient roots, worship in the New Covenant retains the spirit of chaste fear before the Lord, the awareness of stages of ascent into the holy presence of God, and a ministerial hierarchy that reflects the nature of the cosmos and the descent of grace from the Redeemer through the members of His mystical Body. These truths are consummately expressed in the spaces and structures of classic church architecture, furnishings, vestments, and vessels, and poignant prayers and gestures of homage, adoration, and humility.

Traditionally, the sanctuary above all was seen as the domain of Christ the High Priest, and therefore an area symbolically set apart from the rest of the Church, with all-male ministerial service — a custom that Roman Catholics kept intact for nearly 2,000 years in continuity with the Israelites who went before us, and that the Eastern Churches preserve in full integrity to this day.

Let us recall the rationale behind the custom of limiting service in the sanctuary and at the altar to men only. Servers and lectors are in some way an extension of the ministry of the priesthood, to which it properly belongs to handle the divine mysteries and all that is associated with them. Only men can be priests; therefore only males are suited to priestly functions. Moreover, servers and lectors are a substitute for clerics in minor orders, who, in optimal conditions, are the ones called upon by the Church to fulfill these very offices. The formal ministries of acolyte and lector, even after Pope Paul VI’s simplification and reconfiguration thereof, are open only to men. Ministers are men set apart by the Church for a special function that is not equivalent to general lay participation in the liturgy. Finally, serving as an altar boy was and still is a much-valued way to encourage vocations to the priesthood.[1]

Not long after the Council, this hitherto unbroken practice was abandoned, with the allowance of female lectors and, later, female altar servers. Now women and men freely mingle in the sanctuary and even at the very altar of sacrifice. Not only is this development contrary to the religious instincts of most cultures[2] and to well-known psychological requirements of boys,[3] it is also contrary to the common good of modern Christians who are living in an age of massive sexual confusion, where distinctions are blurred and the combination of reductive feminism and democratic egalitarianism treats men and women as if they were interchangeable.[4]

While Christian anthropology is sufficiently different from that of other cultures and religions to allow St. Paul to say that “in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female” (Gal 3:28), the context itself and the exegesis of the Church Fathers show us that the Apostle is referring to the dignity of baptism and the goal of salvation: the grace of eternal life is freely available to all, with no distinction of race, class, or sex. Heroic charity is in the reach of every baptized man, woman, and child, and the hierarchy of heaven is established according to charity. This fundamental truth simply does not touch on how the Christian religion, as visibly and socially embodied in this world, makes use of the God-authored order of creation (and, in particular, the permanent features of human nature) for the hierarchical form of its organization and worship.

The ideological shotgun wedding of feminism and egalitarianism strikes at the fundamental language of revelation, wherein God/Christ is the bridegroom who acts and fertilizes, becoming the father and head of the family, and man/Israel/the Church the bride who receives as wife and bears fruit as a mother. As I have written elsewhere:

To ignore differences of sex or to pretend that such differences make (or should make) no difference in the fulfilling of liturgical roles is surely to ignore, and probably to contradict, the “theology of the body” given to the Church by Pope John Paul II. Especially in our times, when confusion about sexuality is rampant, how we conceptualize and implement male and female roles in the Church cannot fail to have huge ramifications in our theological anthropology, moral theology, and even fundamental theology, extending all the way to the inerrancy of Scripture and the trustworthiness of apostolic Tradition.[5]

At the very least, it is not beneficial to the faithful to allow traditional practices to be canceled out as if they were arbitrary exercises of power, mistaken to begin with — particularly when these practices have sound anthropological and dogmatic foundations.

In the case at hand, the gradual breaking down of various distinctions such as those between sanctuary and nave, ordained and non-ordained, ministers and recipients, has been able to feed into and feed upon the larger societal dissolving of distinctions between men and women, creating a perfect storm of confusion for the faithful.

A failure to see how the natural distinction of sexes is ordered to the common good of mankind and of the Church has, without a doubt, led to many abuses of power on the part of pastors or laity who take it upon themselves to create, abolish, or innovatively redefine offices, functions, symbols, and rites.

Pastors concerned with communicating and reinforcing authentic Catholic doctrine should become more concerned with the many ways, open and subtle, in which our liturgical practices symbolize certain truths of creation and redemption or, on the contrary, obfuscate that symbolism and risk undermining those truths.


NOTES

[1] See this article for further argumentation.

[2] See Manfred Hauke, Women and the Priesthood: A Systematic Analysis in Light of the Order of Creation and Redemption, trans. David Kipp (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988), esp. 85–194; cf. idem, God or Goddess? Feminist Theology: What Is It? Where Does It Lead?, trans. David Kipp (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1995).

[3] I am referring here to the oft-observed pastoral phenomenon of male servers dropping away and recruits drying up when girls flow into the ranks and take over (something known to be off-putting for boys of a certain age range in particular), and the opposite phenomenon of boys and young men volunteering in large numbers to serve when the ministry is all-male, exacting in its duties and run along the lines of a disciplined band of soldiers.

[4] See Peter Kwasniewski, “Incarnate Realism and the Catholic Priesthood,” originally published in Homiletic & Pastoral Review 100.7 (April 2000): 21–29; online here.

[5] Published as Benedict Constable, “Should Women Be Lectors at Mass?”

A Brief Dialogue on Liturgical Development and Corruption

The following dialogue occurs between a traditionalist and a Catholic of good will who has started attending the old Mass but is still trying to understand the traditionalist’s position.

Oliver: I've often hear you say, Charlie, that the Novus Ordo represents a huge rupture with the preceding liturgical tradition. But you never comment about other changes in the history of liturgy, like the development of the whispered low Mass, that also break with preceding tradition — I guess because traditionalists are okay with these things. So what’s the difference? When is a new direction not truly a rupture? Or is it a “development” if you happen to agree with it, and a “rupture” if you happen to dislike it?

Charles: Great question. I would say that developments come in two basic “flavors”: those that flow forth in harmony with something profoundly within the liturgy, like a flower from a tree, and those that are imposed from without in a mechanistic way, like a prosthetic limb.

Oliver: Could you illustrate your distinction in reference to the low Mass example?

Charles: The liturgy is certainly meant to be sung in its solemn form — you, of all people, know I’ve defended that many times. However, the mystery of the Mass also allows for and invites the priest to an intense mysticism of intercession, oblation, and communion. Thus, it is easy to see how, especially in monastic settings with an abundance of priests, the private daily Mass emerged in contradistinction to the conventual or parochial Mass. This need not be seen as a problem, unless it becomes the norm for communal Mass and edges out the sung liturgy.

Oliver: But how would you defend the proposition that this change was incidental and not substantive?

Charles: One might say that the same Mass exists at different levels of execution, like the difference between a Shakespeare play read quietly to oneself, the same play read aloud by a group of friends, and the play fully acted out in costume on the stage with props and so forth. It is the same play, but realized more or less fully according to its essence as a play. Any of those actualizations of the play are based on one and the same play. Think how different it would be if, instead of this, you had a modernized redaction of Shakespeare that purged Catholic references so as not to offend Protestants, changed the vocabulary to contemporary English, and changed the gender of the starring roles! In the latter case, even if the play was given the same title, it would no longer be the same reality — no matter how well you acted it out on stage.

Oliver: I see what you’re getting at. But here’s something that’s bothered me. How long does it take until something can be considered part of ecclesiastical tradition? If a parish has communion in the hand for 40 years, does this then become part of tradition? Imagine if — God forbid! — altar girls are the norm for the next hundred years. In the year 2118, can one look back and say “this is not and never has been ecclesiastical tradition,” or would one say “this is a tradition, but it’s bad and we should change it”?

Charles: Let’s take up the question of communion first. When the Latin Church shifted in the Middle Ages to communion under the species of bread alone, given on the tongue to faithful who are kneeling, it was for good reasons: it fosters a spirit of humility and adoration, and, on a practical level, is easier and safer. It is, in other words, completely in accord with the letter and spirit of the liturgical action, something that emerges from a deeper grasp of the mystery of the Holy Eucharist. Therefore, there could never be a compelling reason to undo this development, unless we wanted less safety, less humility, and less adoration. But that could only come from the devil.

In fact, Paul VI himself recognized that communion on the tongue was superior and reasserted it, although he then allowed the abuse of communion in the hand to sweep over the Church because he was an indecisive and confused shepherd — even his best decisions still have something of Hamlet mixed in with them, as when he called a commission to look into contraception, which raised false hopes among the progressives. But I digress…

Oliver: So you don’t buy the argument that it was good to restore communion in the hand because “it’s what used to be done in ancient times”?

The right way

Charles: This both begs the question — why did the custom change if it was so good to begin with? — and contradicts the teaching of Pope Pius XII that we should avoid antiquarianism, i.e., returning to an older practice just because it is older. When an early custom was universally left behind and another put in its place, we should see this as a recognition of a superior line of conduct.

Oliver: Would this apply to the Novus Ordo as well, since it was universally put in place of the old rite of Mass?

Charles: Of course not. First, thanks to the protection of the Holy Spirit, Paul VI, who wanted to abolish the old liturgy, never successfully abrogated it, as Pope Benedict XVI later acknowledged. So the old liturgy has always remained legitimate (and, indeed, it could never be otherwise). Moreover, while the Tridentine liturgical books were eventually received universally, the Novus Ordo was resisted from the beginning by an intrepid number of clergy and laity, and this refusal to accept the rupture has not faded away but has actually grown over the decades. In this way it is simply a fact that the Novus Ordo, while unfortunately the predominant rite, cannot be said to have supplanted and replaced the old rite, whereas communion on the tongue to kneeling faithful totally replaced any other manner of reception in the Middle Ages. Thus one cannot, in principle or in practice, make the argument that the more recent rite is superior to the more ancient rite. But one would have to say quite a bit more on this matter, and maybe we are drifting from the main point...

Oliver: Let me ask a general question. Why don’t you think there should be continual change in the liturgy — you know, different things for different ages and peoples?

Charles: I recognize that there can and will be small changes, like the addition of new feasts or saints to the calendar, or new prefaces, but not large-scale changes. Church history shows that development starts out at a more rapid pace and slows down increasingly as the liturgy reaches perfection. In a way, it is like molten lava that erupts from a fissure and gradually cools to become solid. In the same way, the liturgy gushed forth from the heart of Jesus on the Cross, and solidified over the centuries as holy men and women continued to pray it, showing great reverence to what they inherited from their predecessors.

Oliver: The Byzantine Divine Liturgy, for instance, has changed very little over the last several centuries, and the great majority of Eastern Christians see no need to change it, since it accomplishes so well what it exists for.

Charles: Exactly. The traditional Roman liturgy grew to its mature grandeur more slowly than did the Byzantine, but the same progressive solidification and the same conservative instinct can be seen in it. The Roman Canon was complete by the start of the seventh century; then most of the remaining ceremonies by the early Middle Ages; and finally the prayers at the foot of the altar and the Last Gospel in the late Middle Ages. At this point it no longer needed to evolve and could remain solid and stable for almost 500 years (from 1570 to 1962). Those who use it today see no need to “develop” it further; on the contrary, they unanimously wish to keep the Mass in its fullness, prior to the corruptions introduced by Pius XII after 1948.

Oliver: I know that some people compare the process you are describing to the way a human being develops. Do you think that analogy holds? It seems like one would run into the problem of aging and senility…

Charles: Rightly understood, this analogy works. A child changes tremendously on the way to adulthood, but the pace of change becomes less as time goes on. Everyone knows that one year of time means something very different in the first 10 years of life, the second 10 years, and the remaining decades. Time, for organic things, is not simple and undifferentiated. And if we were not fallen beings, we might remain adults at approximately age 33 for our entire lives. The liturgy grows to maturity and then remains at maturity, without fail, until the second coming of Christ. Hence, a strange custom that arises in the 20th or 21st century cannot lay claim to being a natural development but is more like a cancerous tumor in a body. It is like an infantilization, a rejection of maturity.

Oliver: But what do you make of my altar girl example? What if we had them for over a century?

All made up and nowhere to go

Charles: As St. Athanasius says, even if the whole world agreed that Christ was not God, the handful of Christians who still worshiped Him as God would be correct; they would be the Church. “They have the buildings, you have the Faith,” he famously said to the small band of anti-Arian Catholics. Similarly, even if we were to have altar girls for 200 years, they would always be an aberration of the Western liturgical tradition, and never an organic development. A machine is a machine; it will never turn into an organism. Schizophrenia will always be a disorder, no matter how long one has it. A man is a man and a woman a woman, regardless of what the confused gender-ideology of the day wants to say about it.

Oliver: That makes a lot of sense.

Charles: And by the way, you have to resist a lie that has gained a great deal of ground, namely that matters of liturgy are on a different plane than matters of doctrine. Someone might say, disputes about the divinity of Christ are one thing; disagreements about the liturgical discipline of altar servers is quite another. Don't lump together Arius and Bugnini, or Honorius and Paul VI. But in reality, every liturgical question stems from and resolves to a doctrinal question. Nothing we do in our worship is doctrinally neutral or irrelevant or inconsequential.

Oliver: That certainly seems true, if you just look at the shift in the beliefs of ordinary Catholics from preconciliar to postconciliar times. The next logical question, I guess, would be this: How do we know what stage of development the Church is in right now? I could imagine the faithful in the 15th century saying: “A strange custom that arises in the 15th century cannot lay claim to being a natural development but is more like a tumor.” And are not some innovations, such as the centralized tabernacle on the altar, considered to be a non-tumorous change even though it did not come about until rather late?

Charles: Perhaps the solution to this conundrum is to look at why people make the changes they make. In the 15th century — or, for that matter, any century — liturgy is developed in the direction of expansion. People add processions, litanies, extra prayers, repetitions. They do this out of devotion. It is rare that such things are pruned, though it does happen from time to time. However, what is absolutely unprecedented is for very many things to be cut back simultaneously and as a result of utilitarian, rationalist, and activist presuppositions, as occurred in the 1960s. So I think one can see a crucial difference between earlier phases of development, which involve positive growth, and the contrary motion of corruption, which is opposed to that growth and in fact tends to hate it and attack it iconoclastically — always a sign of the Evil One. When altars got bigger and grander, it was a development. When altars were jackhammered and dumped, it was a rupture.

Oliver: How is one to know that some change ought to be made?

Charles: Anything that belongs to the practical order will involve the exercise of the virtue of prudence: we are making a judgment about what it is prudent to change. But always with a tremendous, even fearful respect for all that has been received in tradition! That is why the Second Vatican Council, in one of its more sober statements, said: “There must be no innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and certainly requires them; and care must be taken that any new forms adopted should in some way grow organically from forms already existing” (Sacrosanctum Concilium 23). The Council Fathers were mostly pastors of souls, and they knew that too much change at any time, for any reason, is a bad thing, as St. Thomas explains when discussing why even laws that are imperfect should not necessarily be replaced with better laws, because it weakens the confidence people have in habitually following laws in general.

Oliver: Of course, bringing back the old Latin liturgy is a change of custom for most Catholics, so it, too, could weaken their sense of ecclesial stability or trust. What do you say to that?

Charles: The only justification that can be given for such a big change is that the good of recovering liturgical tradition overwhelmingly outweighs the evil of disturbing people’s habits. Besides, churchmen since the Second Vatican Council have given us so many reasons to distrust their decisions that it’s rather silly at this point to suggest that we can be destabilized more than we have already been by all the doctrinal confusion, moral laxity, and liturgical chaos of the past five decades. The return of tradition means a return of dogma, holiness, and right worship — all stabilizing factors. It’s like going from anarchy to government, or from a starvation diet to a royal banquet. Only a cruel person would say: “The poor are so accustomed to malnutrition that we should just let them stay at that level, even though we are capable of providing them with abundant nutrition.”

Oliver: Your arguments make me wonder about the use and abuse of Church authority. Would you say there was a similar (although not nearly as bad) problem when the Council of Trent suppressed rites? It seems to me that after Trent the idea of what the liturgy is in relation to the Vatican undergoes a shift.

Charles: Yes, Trent, or perhaps I should say St. Pius V, does introduce a new dynamic. He did not abolish any rite older than 200 years, but the way the new missal was imposed showed a tendency to overreach.

Oliver: One can sympathize; it was a centralized response to the centrifugal force of Protestant experimentation and diversity.

Charles: For sure. I don’t deny that. But in 1570, for the first time in history, a pope took upon himself the role of officially promulgating a missal for the Latin rite Church. It’s quite striking, isn’t it, to think that Catholicism endured for 1,500 years with a rich liturgical tradition that had never been administered or validated by the Vatican?

Oliver: The only thing more striking, one could say, is that Paul VI was audacious enough to introduce a new missal, which Pius V would never have done, or even conceived of doing. His 1570 missal was, for all intents and purposes, the same as papal curial missals had been for centuries before.

Charles: You are provoking me, aren’t you, to take up the question of whether or not Paul VI’s manufactured liturgy can seriously be called the Roman Rite, and whether this talk of “two forms” can really be defended. That’s a longer conversation, for another day. But this much should give us pause: never in the history of the Catholic Church had there been a new missal, until 1969.

Oliver: Whatever the answer may be, it won’t change where I’ll be heading for church on Sunday. See you at the High Mass for the Sixth Sunday after Pentecost!

Charles: You bet.

*          *          *

(NLM readers may be interested in another dialogue that took place one day between two other friends, Terence and William, on whether faithful Catholics are permitted to question the liturgical reform.)

A Model Letter on the Restoration of All-Male Altar Service

This article was originally published in 2015, removed for editing, and is now ready for reposting.

A topic of conversation that often arises among young (and not-so-young) traditionally-minded Catholics is: “Can we do anything about the problem of female altar servers?” It is a problem worth solving and one that is capable of being solved, rather than a fateful mistake about which nothing can be done.

Imagine you are a bishop, thinking about what a wreckage feminism has made of the Church in the Western world, as men continue to feel alienated, women no longer offer themselves to religious life, and a pathetic number of priestly vocations dribble in. You are planning to write a letter to your presbyterate, explaining why you are abrogating, in your diocese, the use of female altar servers. What might such a letter look like? How would you make the case?

* * *

Dear Priests and Deacons,

Praised be Jesus Christ! With this letter I announce, after careful consideration and prayerful reflection, an important change in the liturgical praxis of the Diocese of Bromptonville.

As you know, some time ago the Vatican allowed local Ordinaries to permit female altar servers because, due to Pope Paul VI’s suppression of the minor order of acolyte and reassignment of its duties to the office of instituted acolyte, this type of service appeared to be no longer directly connected with the path to priestly ordination. Indeed, in the old days, laymen, particularly boys, substituted for acolytes in most situations (hence the familiar term “altar boys”). At the same time, the Vatican made it clear that female altar servers are not required, may not be imposed against the will of a celebrant of any Mass, and do not cancel out the good of retaining the traditional practice of male-only service at the altar.

With the wisdom of hindsight, we can now see that this experiment of admitting females to the service of the altar has proved problematic, for several reasons. First, altar servers are visibly dedicated, both by their responsibilities and by their vestments, to ministering in the sanctuary at the altar of sacrifice. Theirs is a role that appears to be intimately associated with the offering of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It was for this very reason that the discipline of training and working with altar servers was traditionally regarded as — and, in truth, still remains — a means of fostering vocations to the priesthood. To serve at the altar is to be involved in priestlike activities. Operative here is a language of symbols that is more powerful than mere words.

Experience has shown that the now widespread presence of female altar servers in the sanctuary continues to create confusion among the faithful about the roles that women may legitimately play in the liturgical life of the Church. Again, the symbolism of a vested altar server ministering at the altar speaks more decisively than any catechesis. It is therefore no surprise that many Catholics, despite the definitive judgment of the Church expressed in John Paul II’s Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, feel that “altar girls” are a first step towards the eventual allowance of “women priests.” Such confusion on matters bound up with the very deposit of faith is not healthy for our faithful people.

More profoundly, Pope John Paul II’s “theology of the body” helps us to understand that a whole realm of cosmic and metaphysical symbolism is literally embodied in man and woman. Even if we are not always consciously aware of this symbolism, it has a steady formative effect on our thoughts and attitudes at worship. It should not be simply ignored in the assignment and execution of liturgical roles. Modern society has shown a remarkable ability to ignore the obvious natural and God-given differences between the sexes, differences that support their complementarity. As grace builds on nature, so does Christian liturgy build on natural anthropology. Introducing confusion at so basic a level prevents the liturgy from exhibiting clearly the spousal relationship of Christ and the Church, where Christ is represented primarily by the celebrant offering sacrifice at the altar in the sanctuary, and the Church is represented primarily by the assembly of believers gathered in the nave to do Him homage and to receive His gifts.

Finally, on a practical note, the placing together of boys and girls has had the effect, consistent with human nature, of driving away boys who might otherwise have been interested in serving or who might otherwise have been persuaded to serve. Boys and girls of certain ages either do not wish to be together, or find one another’s company distracting. A similar distraction is caused for laymen by older girls or fully-grown women in the sanctuary. If the “theology of the body” is true, and surely it is, we should have been able to foresee these problems and avoided them altogether by not having departed from the constant and universal custom of the Church in regard to altar servers. Moreover, boys enjoy the challenge of a demanding and regimented approach to serving, characterized by a manly esprit de corps. Mixed service cancels out this psychological advantage.

Even beyond these concerns, the expansion of ministries to more and more lay people is characteristic of the “clericalization of the laity” and the “laicization of the clergy” against which John Paul II warned many times. The role of the laity is to sanctify the vast world outside the Church, not to take care of the sanctuary and its tasks. The holiness proper to the laity is best expressed when they participate in the liturgical rites by the responses and gestures appointed for them. This is the “spiritual worship” (Rom 12:1) that corresponds harmoniously to the sacerdotal and diaconal ministries exercised at the altar.

Recognizing that the novelty of female altar servers was never to be required but only to be allowed at the discretion of the diocesan bishop, and recognizing also that male altar servers remain normative for the Roman Rite, the Vatican left the decision in this matter in the hands of the diocesan bishop. Accordingly, exercising my right to legislate, I decree that, as of the Solemnity of the Assumption, August 15, 2017, the use of female altar servers is altogether abrogated in this Diocese, and is to be discontinued without exception, all customs to the contrary notwithstanding.

I shall send you a brief pastoral letter on this subject to be read from the pulpit early in June; it will also be published in the Bromptonville Catholic Register. When and as necessary, please prepare your parishioners for the change, emphasizing that it has nothing to do with a lack of appreciation of the countless gifts that women bring to each parish and to the Church. As John Paul II frequently emphasized, the Church is feminine, indeed motherly, in her deepest identity as Bride of Christ and Mother of the faithful, and this is why the Virgin Mary is the supreme model of the Christian disciple. Those who minister at the altar, on the other hand, do so not merely as disciples, but as representatives of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who is Eternal High Priest and Servant (Deacon). This role of representation is symbolically shared by other liturgical ministries, especially that of altar server. That is the fundamental basis of my decision, and I am sure that further reflection on it will show the wisdom of the hitherto unbroken Catholic tradition.

I count on your understanding and support in this important step for the renewal of our diocesan liturgical worship, and ask that you speak with me personally if you have any concerns.

Cordially yours in Christ,
       etc. etc.

* * *

So that is how it might be done, although undoubtedly a better letter could be drafted. One can only hope that, as the years go on, bishops will become more and more aware of the harm that has resulted from unheard-of innovations in the Roman Rite and will take the necessary steps to restore liturgical tradition, such as all-male service in the sanctuary.

Although in the letter it is mentioned only in passing, I am convinced that part of the crisis of vocations to the priesthood stems from the lack of real “vocational training” in the form of a more demanding ministry for boys and young men in the sanctuary, connected with a richness of public worship that feeds the imagination and the intellect. When the liturgy is celebrated in a more traditional way, that is, with a certain solemnity, ritual beauty, and complexity, it exercises a mysterious and powerful fascination over the minds of youths. This experience of the sacred and its inherent worthiness has drawn more than a few men into the seminary, as I have witnessed in many different communities. In that sense, it is not rocket science to believe that nudging the liturgy towards greater solemnity and continuity with Catholic tradition, while curtailing female altar servers, cannot but be a most effective path to the promotion of priestly and religious vocations.

Altar boys, New York City, ca. 1957

Altar boys, St. John Cantius, today