Once again, form of the Mass sparks major dissent within Church
It is a topic that has been causing heated debate since the Second Vatican Council. Now it may even disrupt the long running negotiations between the Vatican and the SSPX.
- Francis X Rocca
- Vatican City
- June 18, 2012
Half a century after the start of the Second Vatican Council, the reform of the liturgy initiated there has not lost its power to stoke controversy.
On June 13, after years of on-again-off-again talks with the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, which effectively broke from Rome almost 25 years ago to protest the teachings of Vatican II and subsequent changes to the Mass, the Vatican announced that the traditionalists had been formally offered terms of reconciliation.
But the following day, the SSPX announced that unresolved "doctrinal difficulties" might lead it to prolong negotiations yet again. Prominent among the outstanding issues it cited was the form of the Mass introduced by Pope Paul VI.
Even among the vast majority of Catholics who have accepted the Mass in its current form, debates often occur over aspects of worship that include choices in sacred music, the correct manner of receiving Communion, and, in the English-speaking world, the revised translation of the Mass, which was introduced last year.
Yet according to one distinguished scholar, such disputes are largely rooted not in the liturgical texts themselves, but in contemporary misunderstandings about the very nature of Catholic worship.
Benedictine Father Jeremy Driscoll is a professor at Rome's Pontifical Athenaeum of San Anselmo and the author of a guidebook for non-experts, "What Happens at Mass."
A zealous debunker of what he regards as false dichotomies and oppositions, Father Driscoll rejects a common complaint that the reform has turned the Mass into a communal meal at the expense of its traditional sacrificial dimension, or that it places excessive importance on the faithful instead of focusing on God.
Full Story: Mass confusion: Misunderstanding at root of 'liturgy wars'
Source: Catholic News Service
On June 13, after years of on-again-off-again talks with the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X, which effectively broke from Rome almost 25 years ago to protest the teachings of Vatican II and subsequent changes to the Mass, the Vatican announced that the traditionalists had been formally offered terms of reconciliation.
But the following day, the SSPX announced that unresolved "doctrinal difficulties" might lead it to prolong negotiations yet again. Prominent among the outstanding issues it cited was the form of the Mass introduced by Pope Paul VI.
Even among the vast majority of Catholics who have accepted the Mass in its current form, debates often occur over aspects of worship that include choices in sacred music, the correct manner of receiving Communion, and, in the English-speaking world, the revised translation of the Mass, which was introduced last year.
Yet according to one distinguished scholar, such disputes are largely rooted not in the liturgical texts themselves, but in contemporary misunderstandings about the very nature of Catholic worship.
Benedictine Father Jeremy Driscoll is a professor at Rome's Pontifical Athenaeum of San Anselmo and the author of a guidebook for non-experts, "What Happens at Mass."
A zealous debunker of what he regards as false dichotomies and oppositions, Father Driscoll rejects a common complaint that the reform has turned the Mass into a communal meal at the expense of its traditional sacrificial dimension, or that it places excessive importance on the faithful instead of focusing on God.
Full Story: Mass confusion: Misunderstanding at root of 'liturgy wars'
Source: Catholic News Service
