Catholic Sensibility

A bit of elaboration on the contrast of approaches in liturgy In one of the posts below, my good friend John describes a bit of the "tradi" approach to liturgy. While I would be nervous about applying the images of a human institution (namely monarchy) to liturgy, I can certainly concede Christ's kingship as a benevolent and just one. As such, bowing my will to Christ (though not always easy in practice) is something I can do as much as is humanly possible. This would be in stark contrast to my sense of the rule of an earthly monarch, or even the Catholic hierarchy. Big time nervous there. My caution, though, would be that earthly monarchy is a derivation, not the root metaphor driving the image of liturgy. Monarchy in liturgy: good as it goes. Monarchy in society, even in ecclesiastical society: not the best we can do. I think John has scratched at one important difference between a modern progressive approach and the traditional approach to liturgy. I think in principle, we each acknowledge the primacy of God in liturgy, both as the object of human worship and as the agent of grace for the faithful. We might differ in a shaded degree with our expectations of the human role. We might each say it is important to bring our best to liturgy: our best intentions, our best music and preaching, our best art, etc.. Speaking for myself, I also think it important to bring creativity and inspiration. New songs not for the sake of new songs, but because we can compose them inspired by our prayer experiences of today. New architecture not for the sake of tossing out the old, but to explore a different mechanism for praying together. (Today, perhaps a non-monarchical one.) New prayers not for their own sake, but because the present age needs an expression of the modern culture and language. Liturgy for an agrarian society with layers (or castes) might fail the test of an urban, more egalitarian people. It's not that suddenly all the old prayers are bad, or that nobody can pray or understand them any more, but true creative genius can and should be put to work to bring new expressions, ideas, and images to the fore. Sometimes I sense a passivity in Catholics. (Just sometimes, someone might ask?) Personally, I cannot abide a fatalism that suggests no response we can make to God is adequate. I had a young friend once, very devout, very holy guy ... but he seemed too willing to allow the winds of grace to blow him where he should go. Little initiative. Little energy. What he was given was enough for him, but I thought, "What a waste!" Others thought of him as lazy, not detached. Christ promised his followers would do "greater" works ... if only they had faith. Quiet obedience to a hierarchy just rubs me the wrong way: my personality as well as my spiritual life. No question that without God human works are doomed. But for the Christian, the supposition is that God is with us, working through us to achieve communion in the world. If Catholics took more initiative, would more efforts miss the mark? Sure they would. But since when are spiritual people concerned about being perfect, or rather, not wrong, all the time? Speaking for myself, I'm willing to attempt new things, make mistakes, learn from these errors and move on. I wonder how many Catholics are all too satisfied to be "not wrong" (instead of "right") by not striking out on new paths? The errors of liturgical reform were not the mistakes themselves, but the refusal to learn from missteps as well as the fear of making new mistakes. The former would be those who have taken root in Vatican II with initial enthusiasm, but have withered for not striking out new roots and pruning branches. The latter would be the current liturgical backlash as evidenced by the CDWS: for fear of making mistakes, being "not bad" is even more important than being "good."