BlogWatcher – Eulogising the ‘old’ Mass

BY MICHAEL MULLINS

It’s the morning after, but many bloggers are reserving judgment on yesterday’s introduction of the New Mass. Sentire Cum Ecclesia possibly encapsulates some reaction in his post titled “The Creation of a Thing of Beauty takes Time”.

“I went to mass at a centre that did not yet have a copy of the new missal this morning. I loaned the priest my ‘study edition’ to use, which he was happy to do!”

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Rocco Palmo of Whispers in the Loggia captured the mood in his post “So, How’d It Go”. 

“One friend quickly sent word on his first experience celebrating with the New Book…. ‘I survived’.”

Palmo writes about servers complaining about the weight of the new Missal, congregations laughing and smiling  their way through the expected bumps of the changes, and nervous priests. One confessed to the blogger:

“At least for the first time, I forgot to pray. When I finished the consecration of the ‘chalice’ I felt cold.”

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James Martin SJ holds fire on passing judgment, but blogs beautifully on the grief he feels for the “old” mass. He regrets that there has been little commentary on the loss of the Sacramentary (book of the Mass prayers) and an appreciation for the riches it brought to the church for the last few decades.

“Any significant change is like a death; and so any change brings about the need for some grieving… It would be odd, therefore, not to acknowledge some sadness over the passing of something so central to Catholic life… 

“Last week I celebrated what was probably my last ‘public Mass’… using the Sacramentary, and as I moved for the final time through the words that I’ve known since I was a boy, I became sad. Most likely I would never hear some of these phrases again. And as I stood at the altar, my mind went back to, oddly, my First Communion.”

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Joe Ferullo of the National Catholic Reporter says his two teenage daughters “are all riled up” about the changes.

“They would never admit this, but Mass is a rock of stability in their lives. The fact that, most weeks, they find it boring and predictable is actually the main attraction.”

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Blogging in The Tablet, British Jesuit liturgical scholar Philip Endean believes the authorities got it wrong and that “a liturgy for today needs to be written in a modern vernacular, from scratch”.

“Compared with its predecessor, the new English text of the Mass images the divine in a more remote, orotund way… [It] raises serious questions about the appropriate exercise of authority and about the curia’s commitment to the reality of Vatican II. Mainstream Catholics are having imposed on them profound changes that are not self-evidently for the better.”

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Former priest and marketing executive John Pinette labels it “Vatican Vandalism”.

“It all feels like a solution in search of a problem. Happily, the Catholic Church has no other problems to deal with… 

“This couldn’t have happened without a generation of bishops appointed by John Paul II, many of whom have willingly signed on to push back as much toothpaste into the tube as possible

“Will this make more Catholics love the Mass? I doubt it. It will make more conservative Catholics happy. And that seems to be a decided inclination in the present administration’s ease at stepping around the Second Vatican Council’s teachings to appease those far right of centre.”

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Among the blogs that have held back from commenting on the introduction of the New Mass, Being Frank’s Opthomistic instead urges priests to make confession more available. Opthomistic claims 90 per cent of the parishes in Wellington Archdiocese and Palmerston North diocese in New Zealand have no set time for confession, and a large majority of those don’t even mention that reconciliation is available by appointment.

“Dear priests of New Zealand, In the vast majority of parishes in our country, confession is either not offered, or offered only ‘on request’. As a Catholic, who for many years did not frequent this Sacrament of Mercy, I can tell you now, the eternal fates of thousands of Catholic souls are put in jeopardy by these approaches.”

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Meanwhile Australia Incognita argues for the banning of communion services that have displaced Sunday Mass due to the shortage of priests. 

Instead she suggests mass-goers should consider making “a special effort … to get to somewhere there actually is a real Mass on”. Or lesser evils such as video streaming of masses in priest-less churches. This “doesn’t completely solve the problem of course, since people still aren’t actually participating in the Mass”. 

“Communion services serve to undermine the importance of the sacrifice of the Mass. We are not required to receive communion each week. But we are required to attend Mass if at all possible.

“Lay-led communion services … put an excessive emphasis on the reception of the sacrament.”

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Finally Veteran British commentator Clifford Longley blogs in The Tablet about a new book that is likely to be controversial. According Professor Jack Mahoney SJ, if evolution is true then Original Sin cannot be.

“The Catholic Church accepts Darwin’s theory of evolution as at least probably true, and has rejected the historical accuracy of the account of the Creation given in Genesis, including the story of Adam and Eve and the apple. So where does that leave Original Sin, on which several important doctrines depend? 

“What happens then to the doctrine that Christ’s death on the cross was the necessary act of Atonement for the Fall? …

“Professor Mahoney begins his book, Christianity in Evolution: An Exploration, with a quote from Pope John Paul II, asking scholars to begin reviewing Christian doctrine in the light of evolutionary theory. But there has not been much uptake, not least – thanks ironically to that same Pope and indeed the present one – because thinking outside the box has often got theologians into trouble.”

 

Michael Mullins, founding editor of CathNews, compiles this ‘Blog Watcher’ column every Monday.

 

 

Disclaimer: CathBlog is an extension of CathNews story feedback. It is intended to promote discussion and debate among the subscribers to CathNews and the readers of the website. The opinions expressed in CathBlog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the members of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference or of Church Resources.