The Liturgy: The Source and Summit of our Faith
The incorporation of the teachings of Vatican II into the Catholic life has been very uneven. The common experience of the Liturgy has been the biggest area of change and the most accepted by the faithful.
I would like to share a personal story leading into some reflections on liturgical reform and the call to universal holiness.
It was about twenty years before the beginning of Vatican II. I was at the Sunday school mass with my fourth grade class. The nuns kept a great discipline and order among the eight hundred students.
My crisis began when the priest placed two hosts on my tongue at Communion time. I became terrified and lost any common sense perspective. I tried to stay in line on the way back to my seat. I placed the extra host on the side of my mouth with the hope of bringing it back to the Monsignor right after the mass.
I was becoming consumed in a sense of horror as the host was rapidly melting in my mouth. My dilemma was that I could never touch the host nor receive two hosts. Likewise, I had to stay in place and keep quiet. Today we would call it the perfect storm of horror. As the host melted in my mouth, I was expecting the floor to open up and I would plunge straight down to the consuming fires of hell. To my utter amazement, I was somehow spared my eternal punishment at that moment. The floor at my feet held steady.
As soon as I got outside, I ran to the sacristy and told the Monsignor about my two host horror story. He said simply, “That’s all right boy. “Don’t worry about it.” While I was relieved, I also was terribly confused. I said to myself, “What the hell is this about?” Somehow I just avoided the eternal fires of hell and he says, “Don’t worry about it!”
This was the beginning of Vatican II for me. It was the first unraveling of the “Catholic world” that was my inflexible and non-negotiable heritage. This was the culture that had evolved from the defensive stance against the Protestants over the previous four centuries since the Council of Trent.
Vatican II became a process of stripping off the rigid strait-jacket that maintained the Catholic discipline centered around the sixth commandment, Mass on Sunday and fish on Friday. Walking with Jesus had become hidden somewhere along the way.
The Dominance of the Priestly Role
In the pre-Vatican II world, liturgy centered around the priest. Only the priest touching the host was one among many common practices that were established in response to the Protestant reformation.
The priest was seen as the mediator between the people and God. The priest was viewed as special, holy and outside the ordinary lives of the people. An entire culture of exclusiveness developed to support this view and help create a warped clericalism.
In the liturgy, the mass centered on the exclusive role of the priest. He prayed quietly in Latin with his back to the people and separated by the communion rail. The main part of the Mass became the special words of the priest changing the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ. This was identified by the ringing of the bell at the elevation of the host and chalice.
This emphasis on the importance of the priest led to the greatly diminished role of the laity. My crisis of not touching the sacred host was crossing the sacred division between the exalted role of the priest and the inconsequential role of the laity. The reality was clear. The priest was the holy one. The laity were along for the ride. They just needed to follow the rules and all would be well because the priest was bringing God to them.
The Church as the People of God
The changes in the liturgy mandated by Vatican II were a radical transformation from the priest-dominated reality in the centuries following the Council of Trent. The basic change was the Church was now seen as the People of God. Priests were part of the common people of faith. They are distinguished by a role as is the laity. The main difference at the Eucharist is not the change of the bread and wine but the transformation of the entire community into the Body of Christ.
This relates strongly to the call for universal holiness. This is why we call the liturgy the source and summit of our faith. Many other changes flow from these basic insights of the new emphasis on the People of God celebrating the Eucharist. The priest no longer is the celebrant. The entire community celebrates in unity. The priest presides over the communal celebration.
The laity have increased roles as lectors, Eucharistic ministers and ministers of hospitality. Likewise, the role of the musician and choirs have grown in importance. The Eucharist is placed on the hand without the separation of the communion rail or the posture of kneeling.
Most importantly, the message of the celebration and the liturgical seasons and scripture readings are all leading into a central and governing emphasis on the Pascal Mystery of Christ. All are defined most accurately not as priest or laity. All are Disciples of Christ, gathered to journey through life in the footsteps of Jesus. That is why we call the liturgy the source and summit of our faith. We are all, first and foremost, Disciples of Christ.
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