New Liturgy, Old Problems
No one I meet seems to like the new English translation of the liturgy. Some have objected to its non-inclusive language. Others complain that it is grammatically odd and full of ancient words nobody uses today. It’s even been called a ‘Latinglish Funakalo’, a reference to the crude pidgin of South African languages used in the past on mines and in factories – seen by most black people as an insult to their languages and the rich cultures that underpin them.
While sharing the concerns of the new liturgy’s critics, I think it might be useful to gain a historical perspective on it by looking at the fate of Latin as the language of Catholic liturgy.
Let me begin with two true stories:
First, a distinguished Catholic theologian was once approached by a Lefebvrist priest over a point of canon law. Unhesitatingly, the theologian handed the priest the Code, opened at the relevant canon. The Lefebvrist glanced at it, handed it back and asked the theologian to translate it for him. The theologian’s Code of Canon Law was written in Latin!
Second, a group of conservative Catholic students at an English university asked a priest-academic to say Mass for them in Latin. The priest obliged, celebrating the liturgy – including a 20-minute sermon – in flawless Latin. Afterwards, a number of the students came to him to ask him for a translation of the sermon.
These two stories are not intended to mock the Lefebvrists or those who like Mass said in Latin. As I will suggest the Latin liturgy has its value and beauty. Rather it is to point out how by the late 20th century Latin no longer had the capacity to meet all the spiritual, theological and pastoral needs of most Catholics.
What had happened? It is worth going back through the history of Catholic worship. Contrary to popular belief, Latin – apart from scholars, lawyers, officials and priests of Roman civil religion – was not the language of the Roman Empire. The lingua franca was, in fact, Greek. Early Christians worshipped in a range of languages – Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Coptic, the Germanic dialects of the European ‘barbarians’, Arabic. A few may have even worshipped in Latin.
In addition it is worth noting that for at least two centuries there were no standard forms of celebrating the Eucharist. In his First Apology (c150AD), Justin Martyr said to his readers that at Mass the presider “sends up prayers and thanksgiving to the best of his ability, and the people assent, saying Amen”. Since not all presiders were that articulate various Eucharistic prayers evolved in different regions. While most had the same content we know today – the invocation of the Spirit (epiclesis), the account of the last supper (institution narrative) and the prayer of thanksgiving, though not all in that order – regional prayers in regional languages evolved.
Even as the Church took on Latin – a language still understood by few, spoken by even less – these regional prayers persisted through the Middle Ages: in parts of Spain (around Seville, to this day in fact) there was the Mozarabic Rite; in England, the Sarum Liturgy; in France the Gallican Rite (which, by the way, heavily influenced the Roman Rite, what is now the standard Eucharistic Prayer I). During the Reformation, as reformers reverted to vernacular liturgies, the Church standardized its rites – in Latin.
What was the effect? From before the Reformation until Vatican II, Catholics worshipped in a language only a minority understood. Even priests, until seminary reform after Trent, could often barely understand what they were saying. Those who had little formal education (some even barely literate in their own tongues) learned the liturgy by rote and celebrated Mass hoping what they said was correct!
After the Reformation, priests were generally far better educated, and understood what they were saying and doing. But for the vast majority of Catholics, the language was still beyond them. What had started as a joyous celebration of faith in the risen Christ and a participation of the Christian community in his Last Supper became an exercise in passivity. Apart from sitting, kneeling and standing at the right moments, crossing themselves and genuflecting according to well-timed bells, most Catholics’ worship was marked by a certain passivity. Many spent the time praying the Rosary or novenas. While there was nothing wrong in this in itself, the sense of communal participation in the liturgy was weakened.
Many have argued that the Latin Mass, particularly the Tridentine Rite, its occasional anti-Semitic prayers aside, produced some of the most glorious music of all time, music composed by a succession of the greatest composers in history. This is undoubtedly true – much of this music is among the greatest ever produced and has the effect of raising the listener to a sublime state that might truly be called heavenly. (This, sadly, cannot be said for much – perhaps most – of the vernacular post-Vatican II music!).
True as all this may be, it would probably be accurate to suggest that then – as now – not all priests had voices, and not all parishes had choirs, to match the quality of the music. For every great Latin Mass there were probably ten that were rather less glorious. Some, sad to say, were rather pedestrian celebrations, the words sometimes muttered and mumbled, incomprehendable even if a congregant had the necessary crib sheet English translation.
Many contemporary theologians, including the Anglican Catherine Pickstock, praise the form and style of the Tridentine Mass for its powerful expression of often ‘halting’ dialogue of humble offering to God, grateful reception back of God’s gift, epiclesis, memorial and thanksgiving. While I think Pickstock is right, her book After Writing is so dense as to be almost unreadable – unless one is familiar with sacramental theology, the anthropology of ritual theory and the postmodern thought of Jacques Derrida. Much as she makes her case, I wonder how many congregants (or priests) have come up with this idea while sitting in church?
The passivity of laity in the Mass was a concern of the Second Vatican Council. In Sacrosanctum Concilium, the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (1963) the Council expressed the desire “that all the faithful should be led to that full, conscious and active participation in liturgical celebrations which is demanded by the very nature of the liturgy, and to which the Christian people…have a right and obligation by reason of their baptism” (SC,14). Noting both unchangeable and changeable elements in the liturgy, the Council expressed the need that “both texts and rites should be drawn up so as to express more clearly the holy things which they signify” (SC, 21).Celebration of the Liturgy in vernacular translation was permitted. Reasonable cultural adaptation was allowed, even encouraged. Fundamentally, the Council declared:
“The rites should be distinguished by a noble simplicity. They should be short, clear, and free from useless repetitions. They should be within the people’s powers of comprehension, and normally should not require much explanation.” (SC, 34)
What had changed the Church’s mind? There are numerous speculations that might be offered. The Church in the 19th century had watched the dramatic collapse of religious observance in the European working class – Catholic workers, particularly men, were drawn into a more active sense of fellowship within trade unions and socialist parties. Could they have found in them the participation, the solidarity, they may no longer have felt within the Church? Was it that the popular devotions among the many women congregants did not appeal to men, who then drifted first to the back of the church, then to the porch and, later, to the pub? Such behaviour has been noted in the journals of many a priest or traveler in Mediterranean countries and Latin America. Or was it simply that sometime in the mid-20th century, as secularisation started to bite (historically before the Council in many countries), did the Church realize that for many Catholics the liturgy no longer had the meaning it once had? Whatever argument one uses, the fact remains that Vatican II overturned about 1500 hears of liturgical tradition – and in the process pointed Catholics back towards the early Church.
What might this all too potted bit of church history say to us today, as we go through our current tension over the new liturgy?
First, I think it says something about language. Language gives power to those who use it, helps them shape reality. It gives us power to express our thoughts and deepest feelings, our joys and sorrows, hopes and fears. Conversely, language can disempower those who cannot use it or are (or feel) silenced. Such silencing breeds resentment or resignation, opposition or passivity. The passivity of the Latin rite epoch was one that came with feudalism, where people ‘knew their place’. With the rise of capitalism and the triumph of liberal democracy came a ‘split’ – people gained on the one hand a new language, or languages, of rights, participation, citizenship, even cultural and linguistic identity. But at what we might as Christians call their deepest selves, their faith, they remained in a world where language obscured for many their understanding and – perhaps without the church intending it – put them in their place. Vatican II’s embrace of the vernacular was on a spiritual level an attempt to bring Catholics into full engagement, full communion, with their deepest spiritual selves.
On a technical level, language is dynamic and changing. Words change their meanings over time, gain new meanings, and lose older meanings. Some words simply drop out of use – they don’t feature in dictionaries most people buy and if one uses them one is at best seen as quaint or eccentric, or at worst pretentious. Some words too become offensive, even though they may not have been initially so intended: an Arabic word for unbeliever, which became a descriptive word in the 18th and 19th century, has become such an offensive expression (used only by the most unspeakable of racists), that I will not even mention it here. More and more, we have come to see that language is never neutral.
We also need to consider the question of participation. Active participation – whether in sport, debates, politics, or religion – is a sign of life and energy. The greater the participation, the more there is a sign of life in a community. Passivity, often followed by a slow dribbling away of involvement, is a sign of ill-health. People participate is what is lively, whether listening to a stimulating lecture, playing soccer or going to church. However much one might cringe at much of the music, groan at the banal lyrics, flinch at the frequent fundamentalism of the sermons, no one can deny the way in which Charismatic-Pentecostal churches are growing here and everywhere. They are adept at creating and building community, often at engaging believers to give of their time and energy in worship and service. At a time where many churches, including our own, are struggling to drag in the youth over 15, the new churches are pulling them in rapidly.
As I read the Council document on Liturgy, I see a daring step to remedy a liturgical impasse that the Latin liturgy – through no fault of its own, I must insist – had gotten into. In its courageous attempt to meet the need for proper language and genuine participation, it offered a careful and hopeful way forward that was faithful to tradition and open to the Spirit.
Naturally, there were problems: the 1970 translation has its faults. But if one compares them to some of the ‘experimental’ liturgies immediately after the Council, its occasional banalities are benign – and at least dignified! No one denies we need to renew the liturgy in the spirit of the Council, authentically one might say.
Unfortunately, as I noted at the beginning, the translation that has come has caused much anger and frustration. Such frustration needs to be seen, perhaps, in two ways: as a crisis and as an opportunity.
It is a crisis insofar as it generates deep divisions in the Church. A simple imposition of the liturgy as it stands may have numerous unhappy consequences. At ‘best’, it may lead to an increasingly passive community, with varying degrees of disillusionment and resignation. It will not renew a sense of life to the Church, nor will it probably deepen Eucharistic faith. It may lead to disruptive ‘passive resistance’, with opponents to the new liturgy blurting out the ‘old lines’ as loudly as possible, disrupting the sense of unity that the liturgy calls us to share. At worst, it could lead to some angrily walking out of the church, declaring that ‘it’s not the church I joined’. If we note that this new translation has yet to be implemented in the major English speaking areas of the Church, we might imagine how horribly these scenarios might be magnified, particularly in countries where there is an active, vocal and well-organised laity who are already combative in the wake of the long battles over Humanae Vitae, married and women priests, and sexual abuse scandals.
What then might be done? How might we consider a way to properly renew the 1970 liturgy which is theologically sound yet linguistically accurate? A few options spring to mind.
The first option would be for the translators to accept that the new rite has not been received in its present form. Reception is an important element in the life of the church, and the acceptance of this fact would demonstrate to the whole Church that we are all an ecclesia discerns et docens, a church that learns and teaches, that takes the voice of laity and clergy seriously in a spirit of fraternal charity. Frustrating as it would be, the translators of this rite would start again, rethinking some of the presuppositions made in their translation process, engaging with critics in a spirit of friendship and mutual concern for theological accuracy and pastoral need.
Another option would be to expand the number of Eucharistic prayers our communities could use. This would entail keeping the 1970 translations and the new translations. Following the ancient principle of lex orandi, lex credendi Catholic parishes would use the form they feel best represents their lived faith. Some perhaps might even desire to use one of the Latin rites – whether the slightly amended Tridentine form or the Novus Ordo. So be it.
Thirdly, which in a sense could be a subsection of the first option, would be for the Congregation for Divine Liturgy to authorize local Episcopal conferences to develop their own local English rites as well, rites that take into account the particularities of local forms of English and the pastoral needs of the Catholic community. Such an option might be a glorious sign of the spirit of collegiality and subsidiarity that has been a part of the most of the Church’s history. This, naturally, would have to be done by suitably qualified teams of experts in Latin, sacramental and liturgical theologians, as well as suitable writers and poets who could together make the liturgy contextual, theologically sound and – above all – beautiful.
None of these options, handled sensitively, seem to me to go against authority or open themselves to compromising the theological integrity of our celebration of the Eucharist. If anything, they seem to embody the best of Catholicism’s catholicity – unity in diversity rooted in the primacy of Christian charity.
