The Church Is Not Glocal -- It's Catholic, Pt. II

Part Two of Three

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Yesterday, I wrote about cultural commodification in the name of "multicultural" worship. Today, I want to think through the disservice we do to ourselves through the same process. In our attempts to incorporate new cultural material into the liturgy, we often replace important parts of the liturgy with something unrelated. It's as though Monty Python took over the liturgy...

The tendency is to remove specific parts of the liturgy, such as the Gloria in excelsis or the Sanctus (which might be the most frequent victim), and replace them with generic hymns. I've already mentioned the "Hispanic Creed." During the same service at the Assembly, we replaced the Sanctus with a similar(ish) Swedish hymn:

You are holy, you are whole.
You are always ever more than we understand. You are always at hand.
Blessed are you coming near. Blessed are you coming hear
To your church in wine and bread, raised from soil, raised from dead. 

You are holy, you are wholeness,
You are present. Let the cosmos praise you, Lord!
Sing hosanna in the highest!
Sing hosanna! Sing hosanna to our God!

At issue here is not the use of a Swedish hymn (though, again, sung in English) but substituting the Ordinary forms of the liturgy for that which is neither Proper nor, to borrow a term, Extraordinary.

Now, when I use the terms Ordinary, Proper, and Extraordinary, I am borrowing from the Rev. Dr. Clay Schmit's Sent and Gathered, a book on "missional" worship. In the catholic liturgy, the Ordinary is that which is used week in and week out in the Divine Service. Certain things never change:

• We gather in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
• We begin the Eucharist with the Sursum Corda and sing the Sanctus.
• We follow the Eucharistic Prayer with the Lord's Prayer.
• We sing the Agnus Dei.

Then, there is that which changes based on the season or given feast/fast -- the Proper. That is, parts of the liturgy are proper to the day and the season:

• We pray a Collect based on the themes of the liturgical calendar.
• We read different lections based on the time of year.
• The Preface in the Eucharistic Prayer changes based on the same calendar.

Rev. Schmit adds to these basic categories that which is proper to a given place -- the Extraordinary. For instance:

• Various paraments and vestments might reflect the symbolic language of a given culture -- we see these distinction between East and West.
• Certain rituals may be idiomatic to a local parish or group. Ed Philips told my Intro to Worship class once of a parish where the congregants sat after the dismissal and watched the acolyte extinguish the candles. There was nothing particularly theological about this act at first; it was just a way of appreciating the child's service in worship.
• Musical settings are entirely culturally dependent. Instrumentation, rhythm, and other aspects are determined by local influence.

And here is the rub. Adopting various Extraordinary forms of worship from other cultures may emphasize the inherently multicultural nature of catholic liturgy (again, assuming that we do so in cultural sensitive and informed ways). But we must also keep in mind the Ordinary. (I must admit, I likely have a broader definition of the Ordinary than Rev. Schmit.)

Catholic worship does certain things. In the Creed, we confess a common and shared faith. In the so-called "Hispanic" creed, we confess what a handful of authors believed and forced on us without warning. There is no time to reflect on what we are being asked to affirm, and we are being asked to confess something which is not held in common with the entire catholic Church. If we were to confess the Apostles' Creed in Spanish, we would be affirming the Christian faith as handed down from the earliest Church. Instead, we are confessing an incomplete (though, thankfully not heretical) quasi-faith.

Likewise, when we replace the Sanctus with something else, we are no longer joining in the hymn of the entire Church and the hosts of heaven. The Sanctus, as it has been received, echoes the cries of the angels Isaiah saw around the heavenly throne and the shouts of those who greeted Jesus in the streets of Jerusalem. Even when we make small changes (such as "blessed is the one who comes in your name,") we are steering away from that which the Church holds in common and, despite our best intentions, actually becoming less inclusive.

The hymn becomes less inclusive because it cease to be what it is: the hymn sung by Christians across the generations. The hymn shared between the Church and the celestial choirs. The cries of the angelic hosts ministering to God in Heaven. The shouts of Judaeans greeting the triumphal Davidic King and Messiah. The hymn which has been utilized by the Church for this purpose since the fifth century. The hymn which unites us all.

And so the hymn we sung instead of the Sanctus, while a decent enough hymn in its own way (if not a bit cheesy), and more than adequate for use in worship, is not up to the task of replacing the Sanctus.

By way of example, imagine two scenarios:

You are at the Olympics, and your nation's athlete has just taken gold. The athlete approaches the podium and she is handed your nation's flag. They place the gold medal around her neck and begin to play...a national folk song. Now, this song is not necessarily bad. In fact, it might even be quite beautiful. But it is not the anthem of your nation -- not the song that unites people from every corner of the land, the song that you grew up singing before sporting events and on national holidays. It serves a different purpose and undermines the moment of national unity during the medal ceremony.

Or...

You are at a parish council meeting and the session is about to begin. The council president suggests that the meeting should open with the Lord's Prayer, printed on the agenda. And so everybody reverently bows their head, looks down at the agenda, and begins to pray, "Almighty God, unto whom all hearts are open...." Again, this is not a bad prayer -- quite the contrary. But it is not the Lord's Prayer, that which Christ commanded the disciples to pray.

Our liturgy has taken on a specific shape and has a certain narrative flow to it. The various elements serve specific functions which contribute to the overall narrative of the liturgy. After the readings and the homily, when we stand to confess our faith, it is the common Christian faith of the entire Church catholic which we are affirming. When we join in that glorious unending hymn, it is the common song of angels and humans that we are singing. In various tongues, rhythms, and styles, these elements must remain catholic.

There is room for change and development in the liturgy. There is room for freedom. But this freedom must be acted upon carefully, deliberately, and intelligently. Even within the Eucharistic Prayer, that most vital and sacred of Christian traditions, there is room for variety and change. But these changes must be acted upon with great care. The Anamnesis, our remembrance of Christ's Passion and Resurrection and our stated reason for offering our thanks and praise, can be re-worded or expanded, but it can never be for anything less than God's salvific acts culminating in the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of our Lord Christ.

The Creeds may be re-translated, spoken, sung, or chanted in a variety of different languages. But they must remain the common confession of faith handed down across the years and held in common by the entire Church.

The Sanctus may be set to a different tune, the language may be updated, it can be translated in to different languages, but it can never be anything less than the unending hymn that the Church shares with the host of heaven.

So, if we are going to utilize languages and songs from various cultures, we must do so in a way that is sensitive -- both to the culture from which the material is lifted and to the catholic liturgy into which it is being placed.