With all due respect, Br JR, I’ve seen too many EF’s discontinued, probably due to underpromotion, distance to travel, time celebrated, etc. While you may be technically correct of the unintention of the SP or UE, I doubt if issuing the moto proprio had the side intent of “let them see how unwanted it is” either. Just saying.
You are correct that it was not the intent of the Apostolic See to “let them see how unwanted it is.” The idea was to respond to a pastoral need of a target population. It was legal to do so, so why not do it?
Some people have turned it into a marketing campaign in the hope that the Tridentine Form will become so commonly used that it will replace the Pauline Form. That’s not so bad, except that they do it in a very obnoxious manner. That . . . is not good. It is one thing to wish for something and another to come across as if one were pushing a commodity or to sound like one has the answer to universal salvation and others are total fools.
But I think that a lot of this comes from the fact that you know what you get with the EF. If you suggest a OF you don’t know what you’re getting, if a different priest says the Mass you may get a guitar, a saxophone, 12 extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist, and a sermon from a guy with a cheese head on. If you suggest an EF then you know that it will be reverent and pleasing to God.
I think that there are exaggerations too. Let’s take some of the examples that you have offered. A guitar, saxaphone, violine or flute are not going to take anything away from the mass, if the music is beautiful and reverent. It’s fine if people love the organ and the Gregorian chant, but they also have to be realistic. Such music has the primacy in liturgical music. Primacy does not mean exclusivity. That was not the intent of the Church when she made this statement about sacred music. The intent is to ensure that such music is never lost, not to exclude the progress of liturgical music. Like any other art form, this too has to grow. It can’t stop at one stage. The Church does not work that way. Bl. John Newman points this out very clearly and logically.
Twelve EMHC may be an overkill, depending on the needs of the parish. Again, this takes nothing away from the sacredness of the mass when these are correctly employed and the movement in and around the sanctuary is well choreographed. I have seen the same done at the local parish where I live. The friars use non-ordained friars to distribute Holy Communion. The congregation is none the wiser. They can’t tell the ordained apart from the non-ordained, for starters. They think that everyone who wears a habit is a priest. But the truth is that there is only one priest in that house and 7 non-ordained brothers. All seven walk onto the sanctuary, get their ciboria and go to their stations with grace. They have taught the movements to the lay EMHCs. My point is that there are parishes that do this very calmly. Just because a person has an allergy to EMHC, does not make the mass any less reverent. The reverence is affected by the confusion that is often the case. This confusion has been eliminated in many parishes.
Yes there were abuses before Vatican II, to be sure, but FWIW I assure you the way the EF is celebrated today is a whole lot different from the way the same Mass was celebrated before V2. The environment is different, for one thing. Catechisis for another. Understanding of the role of Latin and the vernacular for still another.
There is validity to this. The abuses were different, because the situation was different. We have to keep in mind that abuses are not built into the form. Abuses go with people. If you had only the Tridentine form, you would have the same people celebrating the mass. Therefore, you are likely to find many abuses.
Sometimes, what people call abuses are not that at all. We have an EF for the Immaculate Conception. Some people complaint to the superior that there were abuses. When he asked what they were the complaints were that the priest said the canon with a microphone. The prayers were said between the priest and the congregation, not the priest and the server. There were priests on the sanctuary without vestments. The chant was plain, not Gregorian and the Hymns were in the vernacular.
The superior politely explained that Franciscans have always celebrated the EF this way, since 1223. Then you suddenly saw the looks of confusion. These people had never seen an EF celebrated by religious using the customs of a particular religious order. They’re too young. Those who are older, grew up in parishes run by diocesan priests.
My point is that many things that are difficult for us to accept are part of a particular culture, be it a religious community, ethnic group or specific need.
There can be abuse in either form and there have been, but there is also something called “false alarm”. People call abuse things that are allowed by the Church for specific reasons. We need to slow down and allow people to worship using what the Church allows. We need to do it correctly in both forms. And we need to accept what the Church allows, even if we don’t like it.
I don’t like female EMHC. The way that I deal with it is quite simple. I remind myself of something that we were taught in novitiate. “You are to obey, even when you disagree, unless you are asked to sin. You are not to question authority.” So I sit there and remind myself. “I have no right to question this,” and I move on. I’ve done this for so long that I can do it without thinking about it.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF :christmastree1:
