Transcript:
Unfortunately, I cannot speak Polish, but I understand more than I can speak. First, I would like to thank Mr. Christian for his introduction and greetings, also to the publishing house Esprit, which published this book here in Poland. I’m happy to greet everyone you present at this presentation, especially those who have to stand, I regret.
So first, I would like to share with you some remarks about this book. I have to say it was not my idea to write this book. It was Mr. Aurelio Porfiri, who is a composer and musician in Rome, who asked and suggested I do this. So I agreed and we had some discussions, and then after it, I made the full redaction of the book.
First, I would like to share with you the words that Cardinal Robert Sarah wrote in support of the book, “The Catholic Mass,” saying, “The liturgy is made for God and not for ourselves.” Cardinal Ratzinger wrote this already in 2004, so our beloved Pope Emeritus, who passed away, wrote these words, I repeat, in 2004, “The liturgy is made for God and not for ourselves.” Cardinal Sarah continues, “This is even truer of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. It is God’s work, not ours, even though by the grace of baptism we are privileged participants in his saving action.”
The image on the cover of the book illustrates the main idea of the book, that is to say, despite the situation of the liturgical ruins in which the church has been for several decades, we must continue to guard the unique treasure of the traditional liturgy, which is a millennial liturgy of the saints, and not only to keep this liturgy but to cultivate and promote it. The only solution to this state of spiritual ruins consists in putting God back at the center of the Liturgy of the Mass.
The sacred liturgy is first and foremost the glorification of the Most Holy Trinity, which the incarnate Son of God offered in the name of all mankind and the entire creation to his divine Father in the Holy Spirit. Through his sacrifice on the cross as a sweet fragrance for all eternity, the Holy Mass renders present in a sacramental way the same liturgy of the sacrifice of the cross, with the same priest Jesus Christ and the same victim Christ in his sacred humanity, present at Mass as he was present in the sacrifice of the cross. Hence, the sacred liturgy is primarily and essentially the glorification of the Triune God. Such a perfect glorification of God secondarily brings graces and eternal salvation to all who celebrate it, who participate in it, and for whom it is specifically offered.
Without a doubt, the way Holy Mass is celebrated in most cases around the world in the Roman Rite is not what the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council intended, even if the Mass is celebrated according to the new liturgical books. One need only read the debates about the liturgy in the conciliar acts to discover that the Council Fathers could hardly imagine a celebration of Holy Mass where the celebrant is continuously facing the people, a Mass where the traditional offertory prayers were replaced by prayers from the Jewish Sabbath supper, thereby diluting the sacrificial character of the Eucharistic liturgy and adapting it more to the Protestant meaning of a banquet. A Mass where numerous other and often newly invented Eucharistic prayers can be substituted for the Roman Canon, a Mass where the vernacular is used exclusively, a Mass where Holy Communion is received standing and in the hand, a Mass where there are lay people distributing Holy Communion, a Mass where women and men in civil clothes function as lectors and where girls and women serve as acolytes, sometimes clothed in clerical vestments, cassock and surplice. When one takes into account all of these elements, unfortunately approved by the Holy See for the celebration of the new rite of the Mass, the need for a reform of the reform of the sacred liturgy becomes an evident and urgent demand.
The so-called extraordinary form of the Mass, which I, however, would call the constant form of the Roman liturgy of the Mass, is in its prayers and rites without any doubt objectively, theologically, and spiritually richer, for it expresses more clearly the essence of the Holy Mass. It is the sacrifice of our Lord on the cross, and the sacredness and sublimity of the heavenly liturgy. I think that in the future, the new order of Mass should be reformed in such a way that it becomes closer and more similar to the constant and more ancient form of the Roman Rite of the Mass, called today the extraordinary form. In this way, it will reflect more faithfully the perennial sense of the liturgical spirit of the Church, which was the true intention of the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council.
The traditional liturgy, that is to say the “usus antiquior” of the Roman Rite, proclaims in its smallest details and in a striking manner the centrality of God. In the new order of Mass, the centrality of God is not so clearly visible. It is obscured by several ritual elements that are both vague and anthropocentric.
If the Church Fathers, let us say St. Athanasius, St. Augustine, and St. John Chrysostom, were in some way teleported to our time, they would undoubtedly feel more at home in the traditional liturgy than in the Novus Ordo. Why? The Church Fathers were imbued in an incomparable way with the sense of mystery, silence, and reverence.
Cardinal John Henry Newman, the famous English Cardinal who wrote in the 19th century, made a comparison. He said, let us say these Church Fathers would come today to England, and they would not go to the beautiful cathedrals of the Anglican Church, but they would seek a small chapel, maybe at the periphery of the city, where they would celebrate a Catholic Mass.
The Holy Mass is truly the tree of life for the church. This tree of life of the Eucharistic sacrifice, planted by God in the Garden of the church, rears its blooming top high toward heaven and spreads wide its shady branches over the earth, dropping down graces and blessings on all men. The liturgy is not something that belongs to us but to God, who invites us to participate in something that is his. We see this in the response of the faithful to the “Orate Fratres,” “May the Lord receive the sacrifice from thy hands to the praise and glory of his name, to our benefit and that of all his holy Church.” The whole church is mentioned here; the Mass includes the whole church. The Catholic vision is universal, as we see from the church’s inception beginning at Pentecost, with the Blessed Virgin Mary and the apostles gathered in the upper room. This characteristic is distinctive of Catholic worship.
Saint Peter Julian Eymard, a saint from the 19th century from France and one of the greatest Eucharistic saints of modern times, observed that when missionaries came to a pagan people, they first established the tabernacle, the presence of Christ, as the command post to win these pagan souls to God. Every time Christ takes possession of a country, he pitches his Eucharistic royal tent. The erection of a tabernacle is his official occupation of a country. In our own day, Christ still goes out to uncivilized nations, and wherever the Eucharist is brought, the people are converted to Christianity.
The Mass is not ours, even if today many clerics think they can manipulate it at will. This is profoundly wrong. Such an attitude is a reflection of modern times and of its deepest sickness, which is anthropocentrism, a spirit of autonomy, and a loss of a supernatural perspective. The idea that we are the ones who make the liturgy, and our failure to understand that Christ is always the main protagonist, derives from this illness. We are invited to participate in something that has been given to us by Christ and is an organic expression of the church tradition. We are not the ones who animate the liturgy. The true animator of the liturgy is Christ; he is the main celebrant. Christ gives the liturgical celebration its true soul, its true spirit, and its true spiritual attitudes, in order that a given liturgical action may be pleasing to God. A Holy Mass celebrated by one priest individually is not less spiritually animated than one concelebrated by many priests. The most important action in the Mass is Christ’s, even if the priest celebrates Mass alone. Theologically speaking, we can say that he concelebrates with Christ, who is the main celebrant.
Our dignity consists in participating in what we have been given, not in activism. Another spiritual sickness of our day connected with anthropocentrism is neo-Pelagianism, which makes us believe that salvation depends on our action, our activism, or our liturgical animation. We should heal these diseases through a reform of the reform. Our participation in the Mass does not mean that we have to invent something. The deepest liturgical participation consists in joining in the action of Christ with the voice of the church, spanning the centuries. For the Catholic faithful, the greatest action consists in giving themselves spiritually with all the crosses of their lives as an offering with Christ. This is the greatest activism, to be able during the Mass to accept one’s crosses and setbacks in a loving union with Christ. This is true activism, not the disruption of the external rite that often passes as participation. This is the action God expects of us, and which culminates in the worthy and fruitful reception of the Holy Communion. In this regard, we have to stress this again.
In the new liturgy, a fictitious bishop says, there is no talk now of the adoration of God. At best, we adore humanity, at worst, ourselves. One sees it in our buildings. There are churches built for the “Kyrie,” such as the austere Cistercian abbeys. There are those built for the “Gloria,” such as the great cathedrals and high Baroque. Some are built for both, like the late Romanesque and early Renaissance. Today, the modern churches are built for neither. They are transformed into halls for encounter and dialogue, where the sacred microphone is the only ornament.
I might be prepared to look at a new Mass form if it magnified God still more and exalted him still higher, if it lowered man still further in the imagination of his heart, if the mysteries appeared more wondrous and the doctrines more luminous, if the language was more noble and the images grander. But look what we have been given in the new Mass, he says, the exaltation of man and the humiliation of God, the evacuation of mystery and ambiguity in doctrine, the flattest of images, and such a conversational, vernacular language.
Anyway, how wonderful it is that you should have rediscovered the Mass, the traditional Mass. I am sure that therein lies the explanation as to why divine providence allowed it to be hidden. The traditional Mass, he spoke 40 years ago, we took for granted all of those things conceivable, the most stupendous, the Mass in which eternity touches time, the infinite is circumscribed, and the omnipotent is helpless. Yes, we dared to take it for granted, so by the authority of his Vicar, Pope, his bishops, his priests, Christ hid it away, the traditional Mass, so that we could find it again. That is why you, he said to a bishop, and I have done. We shall not easily allow it to be hidden again, the traditional Mass. So he spoke 40 years ago.
The entire church, with the celebrant, has to turn towards the Lord, the orientation of the celebrant towards the Lord, in the apse, in the tabernacle. This is connected with the theme about which we spoke earlier here, the supernatural, because the loss of the supernatural is a turning of man toward himself, a focus on self. This is the core of naturalism, and this is reflected very visibly in the manner of celebrating Mass, facing the people, “versus populum,” introduced not by the council, but after the council. We see this manner being used throughout almost the entire church today. We have before our eyes this man-focused shape of the liturgy, and this reflects the life of the church. This reflects her primary disease, the disease of anthropocentrism.
The reform should consist in the outset of turning once again toward the Lord. We oftentimes read in the Psalms, it is beautiful. The Lord says, “Turn to me,” through the prophet Zechariah. God says, “Turn to me, and I will turn to you.” At the beginning of the traditional Mass, there is that beautiful line from Psalm 84 which says, “O God, thou wilt turn again and bring us to life.” Which life? Not the bodily life we already have, but the life about which Saint John in his Prologue speaks, the interior life of grace, the life of Christ, a supernatural life which is not visible, which is eternal, which is the breath of God, his life. And thy people shall rejoice in thee, and then we shall have joy, true joy. We shall have the supernatural life of God in our souls, and this is true joy. God turns toward us; that logically means we have to turn toward him to receive life, and this has to be expressed also in a visible manner during the liturgy.
We cannot say that the visible aspect is unimportant and that it is sufficient to remain in a closed circle, claiming that the Lord is in our midst. This contradicts the entire symbolism of reality and the incarnational principle. We are human beings, we are corporeal, and so we perceive spiritual reality also through the visible, through the body. Therefore, even if you repeat as we said about receiving communion in hand, “Oh, I love Jesus in my soul, I believe in him, and I adore him in my soul, therefore I can stand upright and receive him in my hand and put the host in my mouth with my fingers like I am putting ordinary bread in my mouth.” This is a contradiction, and it does not correspond to our human nature. Over time, this attitude will be reflected in my inner attitude in the context of the liturgy. They say that it is all the same, that posture does not matter, that we can be turned to one another in a circle, as is the case of the celebration versus populum, and that the Lord is in the midst of us. A circle composed of celebrating people, whatever may be the direction of the pews, instills immanentism, horizontalism, instead of elevation to transcendence and verticality. The first end of Holy Mass is adoration of God and not communal togetherness.
It is an unequivocal restoration of the centrality of God in every detail of the Liturgy of the Mass. We must again proclaim to the whole church this truth that God is supremely adorable, supremely lovable, and that he must be preferred over all things. It is urgent to restore the centrality of God in the rite and in the manner of celebration of Holy Mass.
The first task of a bishop is to speak the truth and not to be fear. I have nothing to lose, because we live for eternity, and so it is urgent to reform again. We cannot continue with such a form of Mass as we have. This is a complete anthropocentrism; it is not Catholic. This is gathering around a table, visually at least. The deepest wound in the church today is the communion in hand. To such an extent, we have humiliated our God to take him like a cake in our hands. This is incredible. So many small pieces and particles of the holy host are lost, evidently, and fall down or are attached to the hands. Nobody can deny this. They cannot continue on such a form. There will be no renewal of the church when we humiliate God and trample him under our feet in our churches. We have to awaken to stop this sleep. I am sure the church is in the hands of God, and the splendor, the centrality of God in the liturgy, will arrive again. Our task is to prepare the ground and to do what we can. This gives hope and consolation that so many young people in our days, young people, young families, again instinctively love the perennial, continuous tradition of the church in the liturgy.
Regarding the reform of the Mass, it is a good question. The Mass of ’65 was the true Mass of the Second Vatican Council reform, and no one knows this. This was in ’65, the Mass was reformed very carefully, with almost no changes. The main change was in ’65 that the Mass could be celebrated in the local languages, but only with the exception of the central part of the Mass, which is the Canon. It had to remain always in Latin, even in ’65.
The question for the future is to return exclusively to the traditional Mass or to make the “Novus Ordo,” the new Mass, and slowly reform it. I think that it is more realistic to reform the new Mass step by step and to bring it ever closer to the traditional Mass. This ever-increasing attendance when young people come to these traditional Masses is probably the answer to those modernist attacks of the whole community and all the stuff that’s going on. But then they tend to be accused of traditionalism, even more than this priest, and they call this “traditionalism” detrimental or harmful. Can it be harmful? It is never possible, as Pope Benedict XVI said, that what was holy for our forefathers, for the saints, the traditional Mass, must be holy for us. And when something is holy and glorifies God more, it can never harm. On the contrary, it is increasing the holiness of the church.
This is a very good and realistic question, and this will go down in history as one of the greatest injustices which the hierarchy, bishops, and in some way the Pope are committing, to persecute the holiness of the Mass in the traditional form and at the same time, not interfering at almost, and allowing even evident abuses. The reason, I think, for those churchmen who persecute and limit the traditional Mass is that the traditional Mass is for them a speaking accusation against their conscience, because the existence of the traditional Mass accuses them, “You have to return to holiness, to sacredness.” It is an accusation, I repeat. The existence of the traditional Mass is an accusation for the conscience of this clergy, not lay people, but clergy, high-ranking. The traditional Mass is appealing to these bishops and high-ranking churchmen, “Return to the holiness,” and they don’t want to. Therefore, they persecute them.
You take the first position. This is important, of course, but not the only thing. We have to be converted always, even when we have the beautiful Mass, we have to be always ready and ask for conversion. This is one aspect, but this is not sufficient. But we speak here of another, because the Holy Mass is the public prayer of the church, and must express the conversion that we have to be converted to God, to give him the first place. And this is not in the Novus Ordo or very, very not sufficiently.
Because we are both interior and exterior, we are not angels in heaven; we have a body. And with our body, we see we have to have special rites, exterior expressions, which flow from the interior. So both, us have to be. This is Catholic, not only my interior conversion. And so I will not speak about liturgy and the necessity of reform of the liturgy, because it’s sufficient for my interior conversion. It’s not Catholic, it is Protestant, because the Protestants say only conversion of my soul, liturgy is not important. Both are Catholic.
I agree with you. This would be the first necessary step, of course, but I think also at the same time, the Pope and the bishops must promote the traditional form, because the traditional form will be an example, a continuous living example, how the church must improve and to be present, such a form which was for more than 1000 years a millennium, which the saints celebrated, to have this bridge to our forefathers. A living form of the liturgy, and then step by step, the Novus Ordo can be enriched with the elements of the traditional Mass.
My congratulations on what you did. We hope that this could be multiplied. Of course, we do not have to ask permission from the Holy See, because it was never forbidden, because the ordinary form until now to receive Holy Communion is kneeling and on the tongue. Standing and in hand is an exception until now, so we do not have to ask permission for what is the ordinary norm.
I would do it. I would do this very gladly. But under the condition that the local bishop will permit me to do this. You have to ask him to permit me to consecrate the chapel, then I will do this.
Let us make a prayer at the end, that God will again give his church good shepherds, 100% Catholic bishops, cardinals, and popes.
Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum. Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et Benedictus fructus ventris tui, Iesus.
Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae.
Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui Sancto. Sicut erat in principio, et nunc, et semper, et in saecula saeculorum, amen.
Dominus vobiscum, et benedictio Dei omnipotentis, Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, descendat super vos et maneat semper.