| Liturgy debates end in whimper, not
bang
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
Washington
Five years of wrenching liturgical debate went out with a whimper
rather than a bang, as the U.S. bishops approved without debate, and almost
without comment, two controversial texts and a process for reviewing a third.
The action came Nov. 12 at the bishops fall meeting.
By overwhelming majorities, the bishops approved a translation of
the “General Instruction of the Roman Missal,” traditionally viewed
as the rulebook for celebrating the Latin rite Mass, and of the ordination rite
for bishops, priests and deacons. Both texts generated intense emotion in the
liturgical world in recent years, with critics charging that both reflect a
traditional theological stance inconsistent with the liturgical reforms
launched by the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).
The general instruction, for example, has been criticized for
reflecting a more clerical, priest-centered vision of the Mass. In one
instance, its rules say that laypeople may not approach the altar before the
priest has received Communion, although doing so is common practice for lay
eucharistic ministers in many American parishes.
The bishops also approved a review process for the lectionary, or
collection of Bible readings for use in the Mass. That text sparked such
paralyzing debate that a special 11-person working group, composed of U.S.
bishops and Vatican officials, had to convene in 1997 to put it in final
form.
A key issue with the lectionary was the use of “inclusive
language,” meaning non-gender-specific terms. Critics saw this as a
feminist manipulation of sacred language, while many liturgists defend it as an
adaptation to the sensibilities of modern audiences.
The only glimmer of the old tensions that once rocked meetings of
the U.S. bishops came when Bishop Donald Trautman of Erie, Pa., current chair
of the doctrine committee and former chair of the liturgy committee, rose to
address the review process for the lectionary. Trautman had been a fierce
critic of the way the special working group softened the use of inclusive
language in the lectionary.
“The text is flawed and needs to be corrected,” Trautman
said. “It is unbalanced, it is not proclaimable, and it needs
action,” Trautman said during floor debate.
It was a brief reminder of the fireworks that have surrounded
these documents.
A translation of the ordination rite was rejected by the
Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship in 1997, marking the first shot
of what became a five-year tug-of-war over liturgical translation in the
English-speaking world. In the end, the International Commission for English in
the Liturgy, a translation agency created after the council as a joint project
of English-speaking bishops’ conferences, was restructured and now
reflects an outlook much closer to Rome’s.
The translation of the ordination rite adopted by the U.S. bishops
is based on a Vatican revision of the commission’s work, later touched up
by the liturgy committee.
Fr. Bruce Harbert, a priest from Birmingham, England, and the
commission’s new executive secretary, told NCR Nov. 12 that the
translations of both the general instruction and the ordination rite reflect
the approach of a May 2001 Vatican instruction on translation called
Liturgiam Authenticam.
Harbert emphasized that the commission’s former executive
secretary, John Page, largely had overseen work on the general instruction.
Despite the fact that Page has been critical of some aspects of Liturgiam
Authenticam and the Vatican’s broader liturgical approach, he
faithfully implemented it once it became official policy.
“Page is a faithful civil servant, and this work reflects
that,” Harbert said.
Capuchin Fr. Edward Foley, a liturgical expert at Catholic
Theological Union in Chicago, told NCR Nov. 12 that the review process
approved by the bishops for the lectionary is “broad-ranging, serious and
public.”
“We’ve seen a series of wonderful hearings on sexual
abuse policies,” Foley said. “What if we had a series of hearings on
the lectionary, on how it’s been received, on how well it is
proclaimed?” he asked. “Let’s take our time and do it
right.”
Fr. James Moroney, the chief of staff for the bishops’
liturgy committee, told NCR that he expects the assessment process to
take one to two years, and said he expects it to be “wide-ranging”
including comments from pastors, readers and others involved in using the
text.
In a brief comment from the floor, Cardinal William Keeler of
Baltimore suggested that use of a recent New American Bible translation of the
Old Testament be considered as part of this evaluation.
Archbishop Oscar Lipscomb of Mobile, Ala., told NCR that
while the new general instruction will technically take effect as soon as the
Vatican gives it formal approval, it will be up to individual bishops to decide
when their dioceses have been sufficiently prepared to implement the changes it
requires.
National Catholic Reporter, November 29,
2002
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