Liturgical Institute president
resigns
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
NCR Staff Rome
In a move likely to have significant implications for liturgical
affairs in the United States, Benedictine Fr. Cassian Folsom has resigned as
president of Romes Pontifical Liturgical Institute.
Folsom, an American strongly aligned with conservative trends in
liturgy, has served since 1996 as president of the institute, which has long
influenced the thinking of both bishops and liturgical experts in the United
States.
Folsoms resignation, which comes in the wake of a change in
the top office in the Benedictine order, is expected to result in a more
centrist direction for the liturgical organization. It is the Vaticans
official liturgical institute and as such, opinions of its faculty, and
particularly its president, are widely considered authoritative.
Folsom has long been associated with the conservative reaction
against some aspects of the liturgical changes that followed the Second Vatican
Council (1962-65). He has ties to Adoremus, the foremost American conservative
liturgical activist group, and to the International Center of Liturgical
Studies, a European group for Catholics drawn to the traditional Latin
Mass.
More recently, Folsom has championed more traditional forms of
church art and architecture, a view some see reflected in a new draft document
of the U.S. bishops conference on church design.
Folsoms conservative activism has alienated some
Benedictines who regard it as inconsistent with the orders moderate
tradition. The liturgical institute falls under the jurisdiction of the
Benedictines. Known as SantAnselmos, it is housed at the Athenaeum
of SantAnselmo in Rome.
Folsoms resignation, a surprise to many observers, followed
election of a new abbot primate for Benedictines. Fr. Marcel Rooney, also an
American, resigned Sept. 3 as abbot primate midway through his eight-year term.
Rooney, who had appointed Folsom acting president of the institute, cited
personal reasons for his resignation, but most observers believe it was in part
a response to growing unhappiness among the Benedictines to his management,
including the conservative direction at the liturgical institute.
Rooneys successor, chosen in a Sept. 7 election, is Fr.
Nokter Wolf, a German who mistrusts ideologies.
Vatican sources told NCR that Folsom, following protocol,
had submitted his resignation shortly after Wolfs election because the
president serves at the pleasure of the abbot primate. Wolf immediately
accepted Folsoms resignation. Folsom signaled his surprise by posting a
letter on a bulletin board at SantAnselmos stating that his
resignation had been merely pro forma. He had told colleagues
privately that he had expected to stay on.
The institutes faculty is expected to select Folsoms
successor by election in November. Folsom will remain on the faculty but will
take a sabbatical during this academic year. He heads a new Benedictine
monastery he recently founded in Italy called Sedes Sapientiae (Seat of
Wisdom).
Folsom, originally from [St. Meinrads] Abbey,
did not respond to requests for comment.
Wolf declined to say whether Folsoms ideological orientation
had been a factor in his decision to let Folsom step down. Wolf indicated,
however, that he prefers a centrist approach. It is important, he said, that
neither a leftist nor a rightist controls the climate at St.
Anselmos.
St. Benedict was against all kinds of ideologies, Wolf
said. Coming from Germany myself, I have seen too many ideologies.
Wolf, whose student years at SantAnselmos coincided with the Second
Vatican Council, added, Vatican II is absolutely the real line to
take.
Wolf said his decision to relieve Folsom of the presidency had
derived partly from administrative concerns. Folsom has been acting
president since 1996 because he lacks the proper faculty rank. Wolf said
someone who meets the requirements should step into the role. Also, Wolf said,
he worried that Folsoms duties as the founder of a monastery would
compete with his commitments as president.
Sources told NCR that Folsom enjoys a reputation as a
talented administrator. The decision to create his own monastery at a time when
Benedictines are struggling to staff existing facilities has drawn criticism.
The monastery was a point of contention during the September congress of
Benedictine abbots that elected Wolf.
U.S. observers who regard the institute as important in shaping
the American liturgical climate include Fr. James Moroney, head of the U.S.
bishops staff for liturgical affairs.
Barely a month goes by that someone from SantAnselmo
doesnt make a significant contribution to the work of this office,
Moroney said. He told NCR that faculty members have advised American
bishops on matters ranging from translation principles to the rites of
ordination.
Msgr. Francis Mannion, who runs a liturgical studies program at
Chicagos Mundelein Seminary, described the SantAnselmo as the
premier institute of liturgical studies in the world.
All the best-trained American liturgists have studied
there, he said.
The e-mail address for John L. Allen Jr. is
jallen@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, October 27, 2000
[corrected 11/03/2000]
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