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Fourth Sunday of Easter
25 April 2010
Dear Friends in Christ,
The Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) called for a renewal of the Church’s sacred liturgy, but in the years since the Council ended, that call to renewal has been subject to many interpretations, some of which radically departed from all that came before the late 1960’s. In the confusion created by post-conciliar liturgical practices, many Catholics came to believe that divine worship is something that we create for ourselves and by ourselves, but nothing could be more alien to the mind of the Church.
From his election to the Chair of St. Peter in 2005, Pope Benedict XVI has given the Church a clear path of authentic liturgical renewal which is often called “the reform of the reform,” and this Benedictine movement to restore divine worship to splendor and to its authentically Catholic nature is an essential part of parish life at St. Mary’s. I realize that what you experience here on Sunday is often radically different from what you find in some other parishes, but please understand that the differences you observe do not mean that what we’re doing at St. Mary’s is somehow eccentric or merely a matter of local taste. Instead, everything we do in the ordering of divine worship here is our best attempt to be faithful to the mind of the Church expressed in the documents of the Second Vatican Council, the norms contained in our liturgical books, and the example and teaching of the Bishop of Rome.
Our ad orientem posture at the altar, the regular use of Latin plainchant and polyphony, and the vigorous singing of traditional hymns are all essential features of our effort to follow “the reform of the reform” and to foster the devout celebration of the modern Roman Rite in fidelity to the best liturgical and musical traditions of Catholicism. The priests and deacons of St. Mary’s make every effort to celebrate the sacred liturgy in such a way that the truth of the Gospel, the beauty of sacred music, the dignity of ritual form, the solemnity of divine worship, and the fellowship of the baptized assembled to pray are kept together in organic unity, and we invite every member of this parish family to share in that mission by participating fully, consciously, and actively in the sacred liturgy.
The purpose of these efforts is not to stage elaborate rituals and ceremonies, nor it is to provide entertainment, however uplifting it may be. The purpose of the sacred liturgy is to lead every human person to know, love, and serve the Lord Jesus Christ and to make present the saving and sacred mysteries of Christ for the sanctification of His people. Let’s surrender ourselves to the Church’s patterns of divine worship and make them our own so that we can learn to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
Father Newman