John Allen reports on an address given by Bishop Trautman of Erie, chair of the USCCB Committee on liturgy. The address was to the Catholic Academy of Liturgy.
According to a press release issued by a member of the academy’s Executive Committee, Jesuit Fr. Keith Pecklers of Rome’s Gregorian University, Trautman “contended that the new translations do not adequately meet the liturgical needs of the average Catholic,” and he “expressed fears that the significant changes in the texts no longer reflect understandable English usage.”
“Trautman argued that the proposed changes of the people’s parts during the Mass will confuse the faithful, and predicted that the new texts will contribute to a greater number of departures from the Catholic Church,” the release stated.
Trautman also challenged a recent ruling from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments that the Latin phrase pro multis in the formula for the consecration of the Precious Blood should be rendered as “for many” rather than the current English phrase “for all.”
The translation of pro multis has long been a key concern of liturgical conservatives, who see it as emblematic of how post-Vatican II translations sometimes left the actual meaning of the original texts behind in their quest for relevance.
Trautman, however, said that altering the translation of pro multis now could give a misleading impression of what the church teaches about the significance of Christ shedding his blood on the Cross.
“That change easily could be misinterpreted as denying the faith of the Roman Catholic Church that Christ died for all people,” the press release quoted Trautman as saying.
Trautman encouraged members of the academy to speak out in opposition to such changes.
“Bishop Trautman challenged Catholic liturgical scholars of North America to assist the bishops in promoting a liturgy that is accessible and pastorally aware,” the release said. “He urged them, in a spirit of respect and love for the Church, to be courageous in questioning those developments that would render the liturgy incomprehensible and betray the intention of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).”
Just one point. It is probably not a good idea for opponents of implementing liturgical directives from Rome to wring their hands about "confusing the faithful," since this concern hasn’t been in play, evidently for decades, particularly where the more creative liturgists among us are concerned. It’s not as if we’ve had the impression that they’ve cared one whit about confusing us up to this point.
And, as Tim points out in the comments, playing the "Second Vatican II" card is can come back to you as well.
Personally, I find the dogma of the Trinity confusing. Can we be more pastorally sensitive about that, too?
After we attended the Byzantine liturgy at Christmas down in Knoxville, Michael observed that one of the fruits of a liturgy like that (and remember, it was in English), with its chant, movement, constant back-and-forth between congregation and priest/deacon, incense, iconostasis, etc., was that it rouses curiosity. It prompts you to ask questions, it inspires you to think and to seek because it is not all laid out like a pancake on your plate. Face it. God is Mystery. Who is God? How can God be, what is the power of this Love and Mercy? Is it possible that in this mess of world, redemption awaits me, you, all of us, invites us, entices us? It is not about willful obtuseness. It is about, at some level, imaging the reality of God’s Presence, even as we acknoweldge the reality of that Presence. That is what sign and symbol is all about. By flattening the symbols, by making all very ordinary, we communicate that God is ordinary, that there’s nothing much to this religious business, nothing much at all.
Christian faith is this amazing, heady mix of paradoxes and contradictions. The gospel is grasped by the simple, by children. God is here, right here among us. But that God is …well…God, One mysterious and immanent all at the same time. Pastorally concerned liturgy seems to end up in this odd place in which, because the symbols and rituals are stripped, made ordinary and endlessly explained, we understand far less than we did before.
A series of articles on "pro multis" in case you’re just catching up.
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