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Editor’s note: Our December editorial, with its argument in favor of the celebration of Mass ad orientem, provoked an unusually heavy response from readers. Taking together all the comments we received—through mail, email, phone, and face-to-face conversations—the results suggested an even split in our readers’ opinions; eight readers supported the ad orientem celebration, while eight argued in favor of the versus populum alternative. The letters that follow provide a representative sampling of that opinion. I cannot restrain myself from adding a short observation at the end of these letters.
Celebrant at the altar
In his December editorial (“Banned in Birmingham?”) Philip Lawler underscored the importance of the position of the celebrant at the altar—either facing or with his back to the congregation. It has caused me to evaluate my own position at the altar. Ordained in 1966, I was privileged to celebrate the Latin liturgy with my back to the people. Then quickly we changed to the vernacular and facing the people.
It is true that the Latin liturgy was beautiful and celebrating with our back to the people helps them to be united with the Lord. The purpose of celebrating with the people is to help the faithful be united with the Lord and give him glory in worship. The celebrant—as the Shepherd, in persona Christi—together with the people, leads toward the Triune God. It may be true that outwardly the celebrant facing the wall may be less distracted by happenings in the congregation and less inclined to draw attention to himself.
Personally, however, I find that celebrating Mass facing the people is more meaningful and potentially more fruitful for all. First it challenges the celebrant—not acting in his own name but in persona Christi—to be so spiritually disciplined that he constantly focuses on Christ, not himself. Second, when he is so focused, the celebrant is in a better position to invite the faithful to join him in the worship of God. Third, Jesus himself at the Last Supper was face to face with his apostles, when he said: “take and eat, this is my Body.” They witnessed him praying to his heavenly father, and were drawn into his prayer. Fourth, the purpose of the position of the celebrant, mediator Dei cum hominibus, is to help the faithful elevate their minds and hearts to the Lord. That can be done more dynamically with arms extended, embracing the congregation. Acting in persona ecclesiae, the celebrant elevates the whole congregation in the spirit in both directions, vertically and internally, to the Lord. Fifth, when Pope John Paul II celebrates Mass with the people he faces them. Last, in the epiclesis, the celebrant dynamically intercedes to have the Holy Spirit consecrate the host, and bless the congregation gathered in worship before him.
Cardinal Ratzinger, on the other hand, seems to think that “in its outward form, [the posture of the priest facing the people] no longer opens out on what lies ahead and above, but is locked into itself.” The cardinal has a point. In the outward form, what lies ahead is not as obvious when the celebrant faces the people. But in the outward and inward form, what lies above is enhanced by raising the congregation before the celebrant in the Spirit.
For all these reasons, I cast my vote with Bishop Foley in favor of celebrating the Sacrifice of Christ face to face with the Lord’s people.
—Aram Berard, SJ
Reading, Pennsylvania
As the editor can’t restrain himself from adding an observation at the end of these letters, the publisher can’t restrain himself from adding a note here. Cardinal Ratzinger, in his forthcoming book The Spirit of the Liturgy, actually addresses all the objections proposed by Father Berard (who as a fellow Jesuit falls with me under the rubrical quip “lost as a Jesuit during Holy Week”). Let me anticipate on a couple of points.
In Mass ad orientem the priest does face the people “to invite the people to join him” before turning with the people to the Lord. Referring to celebrating with one’s “back to the people” or “facing the wall” is a polemically pejorative way of referring to the way the Mass has been celebrated for at least 1600 years. Cardinal Ratzinger refers to the modern misunderstanding of the profound roots of the traditional liturgy as “the only explanation for the fact that the common direction of prayer of priest and people got labeled as ‘celebrating toward the wall’ or ‘turning your back on the people’ and came to seem absurd and totally unacceptable.”
As to the Last Supper, Father Berard is simply wrong factually, as so many liturgists
have been so often. Ratzinger quotes Father Louis Bouyer: “The idea that celebration
versus populum was the original form, indeed the way the Last Supper itself was
celebrated, rests purely and simply on a mistaken idea of what a banquet, Christian or
even non-Christian, was like in antiquity. In the earliest days of Christianity the head
of the table never took his place facing the other participants.”
Father Berard’s last point is both misleading and revealing. It is misleading because
in both versus populum and ad orientem postures, the priest raises his hands towards what
is above; so the advantage Father Berard claims there has no basis. It is revealing,
because he suggests by his use of italics that mere outward form is of minor
importance—an attitude indicative of the post-Enlightenment, rationalistic, and
neo-gnostic frame of reference which marks the “historical conditioning” of our
age.
Finally, the argument with Bishop Foley is not that he is in favor of celebrating Mass facing the people. He has every right to do so, and to permit his priests to do so. But he does not have the right to forbid his priests (and even those from outside his diocese) to celebrate Mass in the manner which is still rubrically normative for the universal Church: that is, ad orientem. What happened to “celebrating our diversity”?
—The Publisher
Toward the tabernacle
Your editorial argues in favor of the ad orientem position of the priest while celebrating the holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Cardinal Ratzinger is quoted as saying, “Despite all variations in practice that have taken place . . . praying toward the East is a tradition that goes back to the beginning.”
Although I do not dispute your argument I would like to make a far stronger case for your position, which somehow was neglected in your editorial. Instead of calling the proper position of the celebrant ad orientem, it should be called ad Deum—as opposed to ad populum. For many centuries now—I don’t know exactly how long, since I am no historian—our Lord Jesus Christ has resided in the tabernacle, which has been situated on the main altar of every church. All worship is directed toward the Holy Trinity —as you mention, citing Ratzinger. It follows that both priest and people should face the tabernacle, since our risen Lord resides there with his Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit—our Holy of Holies; our Emmanuel.
St. Thomas admirably expresses this great truth of the faith in the famous hymns usually sung at Benediction, Tantum Ergo and O Salutaris, where we the faithful, in union with the priest, would sing and adore the Holy Trinity.
The revolutionary change in the sacred liturgy, whereby the priest literally turns his back on God and faces the people, was introduced without mandate from the magisterium, and was thus technically illegal. Like communion in the hand, the use of altar girls, and changes in liturgical language, it was surreptitiously introduced, foisted upon unsuspecting priests and laity alike, and once it was widely established it became the norm. This would never have happened under Pope Pius XII, who was strenuously opposed to Mass celebrated ad populum, let alone the numerous other innovations.
Since our innovators did not succeed in tampering with and altering the doctrine of the True Presence of our Eucharistic King, and since they—being thorough in their own logic—realized the incongruity of having this inconvenient Presence behind the backs of the presiders at the scene of the Eucharistic action, which was once known as the sanctuary, they had to remove our Lord from the scene, relegate him to the sidelines, or make him disappear altogether in some hidden nook or side chapel. The rest is history. Now anything goes.
Our bishops have allowed this travesty—or rather this outrage—to occur. We have been robbed of our patrimony. There has been a wholesale surrender of the sacred to the profane. Any bishop who is still a true shepherd and cares for his flock should stop worrying about being outvoted in the bishops’ conferences. If one bishop is bold enough to threaten any priest with canonical sanctions for celebrating Mass ad Deum, I hope and pray that there will be some bishops courageous enough to order priests to turn to God, residing in the tabernacle at the main altar. We should remove the throne of pride and restore the tabernacle to its rightful place.
—Henry B. Westen
Bancroft, Ontario
Canada
Frivolous discussion
I was disappointed and surprised that in the December editorial you made so much of ad orientem.
If we are concerned about priests doing their own thing, should we not start with Cardinal Ratzinger and Pope John Paul II? The Holy Father has celebrated the liturgy all over the world—at the altar facing the people!
I think it is frivolous to discuss this in your otherwise good magazine. I agree with Bishop Foley, who wants to have uniformity in his diocese so that people will not be confused—as they certainly are when neighboring parishes do not follow the same “tradition.”
—Msgr. Roger M. Reynolds
Harrington Park, New Jersey
Offensive implications
As an American Catholic of Ukrainian ancestry I read with shock and utter disbelief of Bishop Foley’s decree against the celebration of Mass ad orientem, citing his need to protect the liturgy from innovation and sacrilege.
The celebration of Mass ad orientem is neither an innovation (how utterly absurd!) nor a sacrilege. It is a venerable tradition in both East and West.
Furthermore, to imply that Latin-rite Catholics attending Mass versus populum are participating in the liturgy more fully than Eastern Catholics who attend Mass ad orientem is offensive, to say the least.
—Brad Karpenko
Hankinson, North Dakota
Ad orientem and disorientation
With reference to your excellent December editorial, I find it most appropriate that priest and congregation facing the same way is called ad orientem, since the sheep-like stampede to turn altars around in the 1960s was simply part of the general disorientation that has afflicted the Church ever since.
—Susan Carson-Rowland
Sheffield, England
Father Berard seems to suggest that priests will be more effective in their ministry if, while celebrating the Mass versus populum, they can overcome the distractions to which that posture gives rise. But ancient Christian wisdom teaches us to avoid temptations.
The responses to my editorial were revealing in an entirely unexpected way. Of the eight people who supported my plea for the ad orientem posture, seven were laymen; of the eight who opposed it, seven were priests. While it may be dangerous to extrapolate on the basis of such a small sample, that oddly symmetrical result is a reminder that support for the versus populum posture is definitely not coming from the laity.
—The Editor
Clarification on Catholic-Lutheran Statement
Please allow me to make a brief follow-up clarification of the article by myself and Philip C.L. Gray (“Not a Full Agreement,” December 1999).
In the absence of a full, unequivocal agreement on the doctrinal issue of justification, some Catholics may still wonder why Church condemnations (anathemas) on this matter do not apply any more to the Lutheran position as expressed in the Joint Declaration (JD). We offer this additional observation:
Regarding the Lutheran teaching on justification as expressed in the JD, the Church does not condemn the teaching because the Lutheran World Federation accepted the co-publication of the clarifying Catholic Annex with the JD and the (Official Common Statement) OCS. Lutherans may not fully accept Catholic teaching on the doctrine of justification as discussed in the JD and the Annex; however, because of an expressed openness to the Catholic position and because they did not formally and categorically deny the Catholic teaching on justification—as they might have done, for example, through a rejection of the co-publication of the Annex—the Church does not formally condemn this Lutheran group’s teaching on the matter, while recognizing that there are still issues to resolve. Thus, the Catholic Church is able to sign the agreement and the Catholic faithful to affirm it in its entirety, properly understood from a Catholic perspective.
Finally, as we indicated in our article, while we can in no way earn our salvation on our own, we can and must help earn it with God’s grace—thus the need for our continuing or ongoing cooperation with God’s grace.
—Thomas J. Nash
Catholics United for the Faith
Steubenville, Ohio
A malevolent caricature
The article “Not a Full Agreement,” (December 1999) seemed to imply that the Official Common Statement and the Annex are Roman Catholic documents to which the Lutheran World Federation gave assent. They are not! The documents are Roman Catholic and Lutheran documents which move the reality of justification expressed in the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification toward more full consensus. Lutherans, however, may thank Cardinal Ratzinger for insisting on them. The officials of the Lutheran World Federation were able to affirm them because they also express the Lutheran understanding of justification and were created through dialogue. Some important differences of perspective and doctrinal expression remain, but are not Church-dividing.
By contrast, the companion article, “Understanding the Doctrine of Justification,” is a polemical Roman Catholic caricature of Luther’s understanding of justification and of Lutheran doctrine. Five hundred years ago misunderstanding might not have been avoidable; in 1999 it is malevolent. If one does not want to consult Lutheran works of Luther’s and the Lutheran understanding of justification —the ecumenical proposal—then please consult Roman Catholic works which do justice to it. One such work is the book Fides Christi, by Paul O’Callaghan.
What is most absent [sic] in the second article, tragically, is a complete lack of understanding of Luther’s theology of the word of God, a theology that makes the scriptural and traditional forensic language of justification insisted on by Lutherans not only useful but helpful and necessary for all Christians.
The Allegheny Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America happily distributed copies of the Annex to the Joint Declaration to all the synod’s rostered leaders, and rejoiced in the October 31 signing of it.
—Rev. Gerald L. Myers
Ecumenical Representative
Allegheny Synod- ELCA
If the charge is that we presented a distinctively Catholic explanation of the controversy on justification, we plead guilty. On the other hand, if Rev. Myers believes that a grasp (and presumably acceptance) of Luther’s theology is “necessary for all Christians,” we respectfully disagree. And if lingering differences between Catholics and Lutherans reflect the fact that the two denominations use different “languages” to articulate theological positions (a prospect which is reinforced by the letter that follows), then it is difficult to understand how a single document, necessarily written in a single language, can avoid ambiguities. —The Editor
Problems with Trent
The careful study of the Lutheran-Catholic Joint Declaration by Catholics United for the Faith concludes that if the Joint Declaration is read by itself without the qualifying Annex, then a Catholic agreeing with its Lutheran parts would be anathematized according to the Council of Trent. This is equivalent to saying that the Joint Declaration is itself contrary to the Catholic faith.
This raises several issues. For example, Cardinal Cassidy signed the 1998 Response of the Catholic Church, which found one could not claim the non-applicability of Tridentine anathemas. Yet he was willing to sign the Joint Declaration anyway, before the Annex was added. Many bishops have been hailing the Joint Declaration with no mention of the Annex; we have even been told that the differences which the Joint Declaration blesses, far from being condemned by the Church, are enriching and corrective for Catholics.
Finally, Father Avery Dulles, SJ (in the December 1999 issue of First Things), found the Annex to be of no help in reconciling the Joint Declaration with Trent, since it only repeats more or less the same things. Unlike Catholics United for the Faith, who qualify the JD with the Annex, Father Dulles ends by simply accepting the ecumenical epistemology of different Lutheran and Catholic “languages” in the Joint Declaration, which are somehow supposed to express the same faith.
—Brother Ansgar Santogrossi, OSB
St. Benedict, Oregon
Warning to the world
Mary Jo Anderson’s essay (“A Crisis of Spirit,” December 1999) was the most revealing report that I have read on the plan by the elite to rule the world—a truly outstanding job.
The future of humanity is at stake here! If people of faith in God are not apprised of the objectives of this program, they will lose what liberties they have and become slaves to the elite of the world.
The prominent names listed in Anderson’s essay—led by none other than Mikhail Gorbachev—point up how serious this threat is to all believers in God; Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, and Muslim. Furthermore, with the US national elections coming up in 2000, we have high-profile men in the race for the presidency who ally themselves with this agenda and are not being questioned about their positions on this all-important plan to enslave the people of the world. The big question is: how do we make the common man aware of this threat to his religious freedom, as well as all the other liberties in the US Constitution?
Personally I would like to see a capsule of Anderson’s essay preached as a homily from the pulpits of every church in the country. Our religious liberty is at stake. Could anything be more important than warning the people of this plan?
—Edward J. Gather
Dallas, Texas
Satan unchecked
Thank you for the most illuminating article on the State of the World Forum and the global movement which is so steadily working to establish a hideous New World Order. The prospects are blood curdling. In days gone by there would have been little problem in identifying the fact that there is one mastermind behind all this: Satan, the deceiver and devourer of souls, the enemy of the reign of Christ in the hearts of men and in society—that is, the enemy of Christendom.
How relentlessly he has been working throughout history to replace Christendom with his own diabolical reign. Perhaps because of our lack of fidelity to Christ, Satan has been able to step up his efforts over the last few centuries. First there was the shaking of the foundations of Christendom with the Protestant revolts. Then came the demotion and removal of God and his Church from public life begun with the French Revolution and continued to our days. However, maybe all the violence perpetrated against the Church by Masonic-influenced and Communist revolutionary governments has been counterproductive to him on account of the many martyrs it has bred. The New World Order, under the benevolent banners of peace, justice, and equality, should be more effective, lulling people into accepting concepts that are calculated to pervert the very natural order of God’s creation, and to erase from their minds and hearts the knowledge of the existence of a personal God, Creator and Redeemer.
How ironic it is that the Church, set up by our Lord for the salvation of souls and the establishment of his reign, should so flippantly let down her defenses precisely at a time when Satan’s public action has become so overtly voracious and at the same time so subtly pernicious. Isn’t it high time that we take account of what is going on around us, take note of where and who the real enemy is, and claim back our tradition—our politically incorrect, clear-cut, black-and-white and down-to-basics Catholic tradition—which throughout the centuries has bred countless saints and martyrs to carry on the banner of Christendom?
—Cristina Borges
Birmingham, Alabama
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