From the ground up. By: Francis, Mark, U.S. Catholic, 00417548, Dec2016, Vol.
81, Issue 12
Database:
Religion and Philosophy Collection
From the ground up
Contents
For many Catholics, the word liturgy brings to mind processionals with incense
and a crucifix, Eucharistic prayers, or the Communion Rite. Vestments, incense,
and music may be floating around in our mental pictures as well. But what about
other kinds of faith practices? Eucharistic adoration or devotions to patron
saints? The blessing of the animals on the feast of St. Francis or the
celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe? Are these celebrations also liturgical? Or
are they merely popular reflections of our faith based on each parish's
individual nationality and culture?
Viatorian Father Mark Francis says that it's not so easy to differentiate
between the two. Even the liturgy we assume is universal and unchanging--like
the Roman Rite that we follow each time we go to Mass--originated with
popular practices during the Roman Empire. Liturgy, a Greek word, means "the
work of the people"; it's the community coming together to celebrate the
presence of God among us.
Catholics around the world may worship using the same rubrics, Francis says, but
each culture and each congregation adapt the liturgy to reflect their own needs.
"If you celebrate the Roman Rite exactly as it is written without being
attentive to the people with whom you're celebrating," he says, "then you're not
celebrating liturgy; you're celebrating archaeology."
There's no time that this diversity and the living nature of liturgy is more
apparent than at Christmas. Las Posadas, Simbang Gabi, Advent wreaths, and the
feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe are all examples of popular traditions
that have been integrated into the liturgical celebrations of Advent and
Christmas.
What's the difference between popular religion and official
liturgy?
Popular
religious custom is essentially that which is not considered official or
mandatory. Sometimes these are folk customs, sometimes other rites. As the Roman
Rite developed, the official rite became increasingly separated from the people.
You had the priest located way up in the sanctuary doing his thing in Latin with
other clerics up there.
People went to Mass, but they couldn't follow it. They couldn't hear it; most of
the prayers were said silently or very softly. All the clerical types up at the
altar were doing all the actions. So what did people do, especially those who
weren't literate? They came, they prayed the rosary, they did other kinds of
devotions. Even today, if you go to Italy you can sit in Mass and someone will
be walking up the aisle on her knees to a statue, and no one thinks anything of
it.
These devotional practices and other things developed because people weren't
integrally involved in liturgical actions. Popular religious custom then,
in a certain sense, takes place outside of official liturgical action. So now
the question is how to integrate the two.
An expert theologian who advised bishops during the Second Vatican Council once
told me a story. He said that when the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy first
came out, he wasn't really big on changing the liturgy. He was happy with the
liturgy in Latin. But then he went down to Palermo, Italy for Christmas Eve
Mass. The Cardinal Archbishop of Palermo walks in to great applause. People are
standing up on the pews and screaming because he's holding the bambino, the
statue of the infant Jesus. He processes very solemnly with a great deal of pomp
and ceremony into the cathedral with this statue. He places the statue in the
crèche, the presepio, and people start crying and screaming, "Bambino, grazie,
grazie!" Then he goes to start Christmas Eve Mass, and everyone leaves.
People had forgotten that it's not just the first part that's important--they'd
forgotten the Eucharist, the most important part of liturgy. That's why reform
is important. The official liturgy certainly carries with it the theology and
the rites of the church, but popular religion involves people in a
way that they sometimes remember much better than the official liturgy.
Do the two ever overlap?
Article 13 of the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy commends popular
devotion, but it makes very clear that popular piety is always secondary
to the official liturgy of the church. How that works out, however, is going to
be different depending on where you are and the customs of the people who are
celebrating.
It's not always easy to make a clear distinction between what is popular
and what is official. For example, take the emphasis on the consecration of the
host and the practice of ocular communion in the Middle Ages. They would put
black velvet on the back of the altar because the priest's back was to the
assembly, and when he raised the host during the Eucharistic prayer after the
words of consecration you could see it more easily against the black velvet.
Most people at that time didn't actually take Communion, but the popular
idea was that as long as you saw the host, the body of Christ, you would get
time remitted from purgatory. If you were a pregnant woman who gave birth that
day, you wouldn't experience pain. In these ways, the official liturgy was being
interpreted in a way that was very nonofficial, or popular.
Even the celebration of the Eucharist, which is at the center of our liturgical
worship, has a background as a cultural practice. In early Christianity,
churches in many Roman cities provided space for the burial of loved ones.
People would come and celebrate the refrigeria, funerary meals that were
celebrated at the tomb. When Christianity was becoming the principal religion
of various classes of the Roman Empire in the fourth and fifth centuries, most
of them were engaging in Christian prayer through the refrigeria, rather than
the Eucharist.
Even today, you can see the marble plaque that covers the tomb of St. Paul at
the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls. There's a hole in this plaque, and
that hole is what they call the libation tube. As people shared wine and bread
at the tomb, they wanted to share the meal with their dead loved one, and so
they would pour wine down the libation tube, which went into the casket.
Other popular religious rites have gotten incorporated into our liturgies
even though they aren't mentioned anywhere in the official Roman Rite. Take the
Advent wreath for example. It's a custom that stems from northern Germany and
other parts of Europe when people rode in carts. Because of the snow you
couldn't use a cart with wheels during the winter, so people would take the
wheels off the cart and hang them from the ceilings of their house. Someone got
a bright idea once and said, "Oh, let's lower this a bit and put candles on it
to symbolize our waiting for Christ at Christmas."
The various traditions about the colors of the candles and all that came later.
But originally, this was a domestic practice that was then translated into the
church because people liked it so much, and it was very evocative of the
religious symbolism of the season.
How can we integrate popular religious practices into liturgy while
remaining true to the Roman Rite?
There's a certain flexibility built into the rite. It's not the priest's Mass;
it's the community's Mass that the priest celebrates, and the priest is not the
only one who chooses what should be done. He's got to choose liturgy in
relationship to the people he's serving through his sacred orders. The Mass
belongs to everybody.
In Latin, there's a rubric that says, his vel similibus verbis--"in these or
similar words." That means you don't just read the text as if you're not sure
who's in front of you. You adapt the text to fit the people who are here.
Liturgy is supposed to invite you into a transcendent place where you're in the
presence of God. (That should also be a part of how people think they need to
preside.) And liturgy doesn't just speak through words. It speaks through
actions and music and art. That's what gets adapted to different cultures and
popular practices.
Look at the ways the Roman Rite has been adapted around the world. For example,
in Africa there's a section that's patterned after what people in the Congo call
a palavra, or a coming together to speak of the village. In this traditional
ceremony, the chief would come, but there would be a person to announce the
chief before he arrived and set the stage. And this has been integrated into the
liturgy; there's a liturgical minister called the annonciateur who announces the
priest, and the priest arrives like a chief--which is also somewhat problematic,
perhaps--and then the celebration starts.
Or another example: The bishop of Hawaii gave permission for hula dancing to be
integrated into the Eucharistic liturgy. In that case, people in Rome found out
about it and wrote to him, saying, "No, you're not supposed to do this." But the
bishop appealed, and eventually won, because hula is not simply for
entertainment. Hula is a form of dance that is expressive of cultural values; it
can be expressed through our faith and call us to better discipleship.
The liturgy is not a museum piece that can't be changed. The basic issue is
this: How can the good news of Jesus Christ be expressed in these rites, and how
can we be culturally sensitive? Proclaiming the gospel has to be the ultimate
purpose because otherwise you're not doing liturgy, you're practicing folklore.
Figuring this out is an ongoing process. It's not something that you can say,
"OK, well, now we've got it. Here's the special rite for our parish." People
change and cultural groups shift, and the liturgy that used to work is now not
really responsive to people's needs or the needs of the community. There should
always be a critical evaluation of what's going on, and this always has to be in
light of the gospel: How do you use this particular liturgy as a means of
proclaiming the presence of a compassionate and merciful God?
What's an example of a liturgical practice that has adapted or changed over
time?
Las Posadas is a celebration practiced in Hispanic parishes at Christmastime.
Posada means "inn" in Spanish, and it's a way of commemorating Mary and Joseph's
search for shelter.
This takes the form of a reenactment in which a couple dressed as Joseph and a
pregnant Mary go from house to house asking for shelter. Every night for nine
days, Mary and Joseph are turned away from the door. But on the last night, they
knock on the door of the church and are admitted.
Las Posadas was originally devised by Augustinian missionaries as a catechal
tool in Latin America. It's also common in the Philippines, where it's called
Panunuluyan in Tagalog.
Lots of cultures recognize this tradition. But every region develops different
ways of doing it. And the question for parishes in the United States is not how
to reproduce it exactly how it's been done back in the old country. Instead,
priests and parish ministers have to work with folks to say, "How can we do this
here?"
The same goes for Simbang Gabi, a Filipino tradition around Christmas. Simbang
Gabi is essentially votive Masses to the Virgin Mary that are celebrated in a
festive way before Christmas. There are special decorations, a glorious
song--the sober Advent season is not so sober in Filipino traditions, but that's
OK.
It originated as a morning Mass, even before dawn. When the fisher folk and
other people there were getting ready to go to work, they would stop and go to
Mass first. But here in Chicago, for example, there are parishes that instead
celebrate the Simbang Gabi in the evening and follow the celebration with a
sharing of all this wonderful Filipino food.
You always have to consider how to adapt these various popular
expressions to the current reality, which obviously is going to be different.
Years ago, I was asked to help preside at a Nicaraguan gritería. Gritería means
"to cry out" or "to scream" in Spanish, and the celebration is held on the 8th
of December, for the feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary.
The gritería involves this long procession into the church, and the presider
usually holds a statue representing the immaculate conception of Mary. But this
was December 8th in Chicago, and there was no narthex in this particular church.
So I was standing outside and it was about 20 degrees below zero and snow was
falling.
There's a ritual conversation where part of the church asks, "¿Que es la causa
de tanta alegría?" What is the cause of such great joy? "La Inmaculada
Concepción de María." The immaculate conception of Mary is the answer.
This goes back and forth as this long procession comes into the church. I
remember at the last question, as I was walking into the church and the
congregation asked, "¿Que es la causa de tanta alegría?" I thought to myself,
calefacción. Heat.
In Nicaragua, it's perfectly wonderful to have this tradition. They have
wonderful weather on December 8th, and they don't have to worry about snow. In
the Midwest, I'm getting frostbitten by the Chicago winter.
If you don't make adaptations to liturgy, then you're being silly. But it's
always important to consult folks and ask them how to adapt the traditions. The
priest doesn't have all the answers when it comes to adapting liturgy and
cultural enculturation, and that's very important to remember.
What about when traditions from two different cultures clash?
A key source of tension is when Hispanic families join a parish that has long
been predominantly white, and the parish has to incorporate different traditions
during Advent.
The third Sunday of Advent is sometimes the feast of Our Lady of
Guadalupe--December 12. Now, if the parish insists on following the technical
stipulation of the Roman Rite, the third Sunday of Advent always takes
precedence over the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. But if a mixed-ethnicity or
Mexican parish elects to follow the stipulations of the Roman Rite, no one will
be in church that day. The place will be empty, because Guadalupe is such an
important part of the Mexican religious identity.
The fact that Guadalupe is present in Advent is a very important part of
Hispanic spirituality. But many times there is conflict between Our Lady of
Guadalupe and the Advent wreath, which some believe is the "real" symbol for
Advent.
So some parishes are combining metaphors: Guadalupe and the Advent wreath, which
is called la Corona de Adviento in Spanish. The problem is that when this is
first introduced to folks from Mexico who don't have the tradition of the Advent
wreath, they get it confused with the corona, or "crown" of flowers arranged for
funerals. They say, "You want a funeral thing in church during Advent? What?"
Again, it's a question of everyone educating one another in terms of what these
symbols really mean.
You could say that Guadalupe is even more appropriate because she's pregnant;
she has a maternity band around her waist, which indicates she's expecting.
She's an exemplar of Our Lady of Expectation: giving birth, giving new life
where there's been no life before.
Are intercultural celebrations and liturgies important?
Think about the Eucharist and what it's supposed to represent. It's supposed to
represent God visiting humanity, bringing us all together in Christ. In a real
sense, if you look at Revelation and other scripture, this whole question of
bringing together people of diverse tongues, languages, and nations is the
eschatological ideal that is going to happen at the end of time.
To a certain extent, our intercultural parishes are an anticipation of that, a
place where we're able to transcend our cultural differences and become one
community in Christ. When we have an intercultural liturgy, various cultural
groups are in contact with each other and learn from each other. They're singing
each other's music. They're eating each other's food. And they're concerned
about the welfare of the other groups as well. At least that's the hope.
We practice an incarnate faith. The use of sign and symbol is very important to
the Catholic imagination. For Catholics, to be able to use a tangible kind of
symbol like the Advent wreath or Our Lady of Guadalupe is to say that God comes
into our world. God is not just an abstraction, God comes into our world and
lives with us.
Emmanuel, "God with us," is the perfect name for Jesus during Christmastime. We
are converted to God in our flesh, and it's through our flesh that God reaches
us. We're not simply disembodied intellects.
That's always been the Catholic tradition. In Catholicism, unlike in most
Protestant churches, people walk in, they genuflect, they go to the pew. They
often kneel and say prayers before Mass starts. They stand, they sit, they
process. This is very embodied worship. We use our bodies to worship. We have
to; that's what we're called to do. These actions are simply aids that call us
into that divine presence.
Father Mark Francis, C.S.V.
President, Catholic Theological Union, Chicago
Author, Local Worship, Global Church: Popular Religion and the
Liturgy (Liturgical Press, 2014)
Author, Liturgy in a Culturally Diverse Community: A Guide Toward Understanding
(Federation of Diocesan Liturgical Commissions, 2012)
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By Mark Francis, Father, C.S.V.
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