David Ancell / Sunday March 21, 2004
I have seen articles suggesting that the new juridical document on the liturgy is now about to be published. It sounds like there will be no new rules, just a restatement of the old ones. Maybe it will become yet another unenforced pronouncement. Then again, maybe something will come out of it.
I, for one, would like to see something done. However, I wish they would be done in a manner other than what has been used in the recent past. These things require explanation, which we often don’t get. One priest explained it by saying that, in the military, when you get a new weapon, you get training on how to use it. When Vatican II documents came out, no such thing happened.
Even today, with the new GIRM, the transition was not ideal. For example, we were just told to stand before saying “May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands . . . . ” without much of an explanation of the significance of it. The change still seems arbitrary to me. Also, Extraordinary Ministers of the Eucharist are not allowed on the sanctuary until the priest has his communion. I fully understand this and applaud it, but others are confused by it. The way these things are presented make them seem arbitrary.
The last thing that we need in the Church is changes in the liturgy to appear arbitrary. It leads to the impression that the laws and teachings of the church are, well, arbitrary. It suggests that they are not teachings handed down from Christ but the whim of some dude who wears a pointy hat and thinks he’s bad and who can modify them at will. We badly need teachers who will get their stuff right and teach it to us.
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