Any young man called to the priesthood must be like St.
Paul: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me”
(Galatians 2:20). This is true of all Christians. Cupio dissolvi — “I wish to disappear.” Dioceses that understand this excel in vocations, and those that do not, fail.
When I arrived at this parish, there were many liturgical abuses.
Let it not be said that these were the predilections of young people,
for there were practically none then. Rather, they had become the habit
of older people who had simply shifted from perfunctorily expedited
Masses and a few sentimental hymns to the fabricated folk Masses of the
1960’s. I put a stop to the habit of applauding the organist and choir.
The musicians we have now would be embarrassed by such behavior. Pope
Benedict XVI said: “Wherever applause breaks out in the liturgy because
of some human achievement, it is a sure sign that the essence of liturgy
has totally disappeared and been replaced by a kind of religious
entertainment.”
There is even a danger of that same narcissism when attempts at a
“reform of the reform” become self-conscious spectacle. Evelyn Waugh
said that Anthony Eden was not a gentleman because he dressed too well.
We try to offer the best to God, but we must not be fussy about it like
the nouveau riche. It once was said that dowagers in Boston did not buy
hats, they had hats. C. S. Lewis’ view was that true worship should be
like a good old shoe, so comfortable that you don't have to break it in:
“The perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of; our
attention would have been on God.” That is a sensibility I have long
admired in the Byzantine liturgies. While some speak of the High Mass of
the Western Church as the “most beautiful thing this side of Heaven,” I
know of nothing so formally transcendent and still so informally
natural as the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.
The constant fidgeting for “theme liturgies” and experimentation
is a sign of failure. Worse yet is the priest who solicits laughter like
a ham actor in a dying vaudeville show. Such clerics should limit
their repertoire to the jokes that St. John told the Blessed Mother as
her Son bled on the Cross. One is struck by the way Pope Francis, in his
personal simplicity and affability, is so enrapt in the solemnity of
the Mass that he would not think of smiling through the Sacrifice of
Calvary.
It may seem that reform of abuses is as futile as King Canute
ordering the tide to roll back. Actually, that great king was showing
his court that human pride has no authority over what does not belong to
him. That is why he placed his own crown on a figure of Christ
Crucified, and that is what true worship is all about.
