Worship Times

Common ground

The first group consists of those advocating a return to the pre-Conciliar liturgy. He asks if they accept the whole of the conciliar documents or not. Noting that it is unconvincing to claim that Vatican II was not a dogmatic council and thus did not change anything, Weakland asks how the retention of the Tridentine usage relates to the whole thrust of Vatican II.

The second group consists of those who accept Vatican II but seek to rethink the way the liturgy has evolved since then. He refers to this group as “restorationists” and notes that they rightly point out that the participation called for in the liturgy by Vatican II is first of all interior. However, they carry this emphasis on interior participation to the point where the assembly is “participating” silently while the choir performs some of the great musical repertory of the past. Weakland asks how this group intends to overcome our strong cultural tendency to privatization and individualism. “How then,” asks Weakland, “can the restorationists avoid turning the liturgy into a concert, the ‘entertainment’ model (whether the music be Mozart, Palestrina or some modern composer) that all — reformers and restorationists — rightly decry?”

He then turns to the third group, those who are seeking to better the reform. Of this group he asks, “Has the reform respected the nature of sacramentality as a free gift from God, as a ‘given,’ or have our people drifted into a more horizontal and purely human activity? … In striving for active participation and intelligibility, have we reduced the sense of the transcendent and an appreciation for God’s presence and role in the liturgy?”

Weakland summarizes by saying, “But it must be remembered that most American Catholics today do not want to go backward. They are, for the most part, content with the liturgical renewal of Vatican II. They do not want to lose what has been gained. They know that it takes time to develop quality and taste in liturgical matters so that they can participate better. From a pastoral point of view, one could say that they know that another liturgical ‘upheaval’ is neither wise nor called for; they just want to get on with the task of deepening the renewal.”

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