Anne Y. Koester
Is There Life After the Triduum?
Reviving the Fifty Days, pp. 98 - 117.
Summary. The General Norms for the Liturgical Year and Calendar indicate that the Fifty Days of the Easter Season "are celebrated in joyful exultation as one feast day, or better as one 'great Sunday.'" However, as Anne Koester observes, this season is often characterized by scattered neophytes, faint singing of Alleluiasand drooping Easter lilies. Perhaps the reason for the neglected state of the Fifty Days is that we have not yet been ready to discover the spiritual treasures of the Easter Season. Koester urges that an important item for the liturgical agenda is to recapture the spirit of the Fifty Days.
This article proposes that the richness of the Easter Season can be better appreciated if we place it in the context of Christian initiation. On the liturgical calendar, the Fifty Days coincide with the period of mystagogy (post-baptismal catechesis) of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, the final phase of the initiation process and the phase which tends to be a weak experience for the neophytes and the entire faith community.
Koester suggests that by taking advantage of the convergence of the Easter Season and the RCIA's mystagogy, we can enhance the liturgical celebration of both. Heightened awareness of the meaning of the Easter Season can enrich the experience of mystagogy, and strong mystagogy can help renew the prominence of the Fifty Days. This essay proposes that the primary vehicle for approaching this task is the liturgical symbols of the Easter Season.
John M. Huels
Assessing the Weight of Documents on the Liturgy, pp. 117 - 135.
Summary. John Huels notes that since the Second Vatican Council, the Holy See has issued about 400 documents which are wholly or partially devoted to liturgical matters. Many more have been published by bishops' conferences, diocesan bishops, councils and other officials and groups. Because most of these documents are primarily juridical in nature, they are part of the body of canon law. Huels adds that assessment of these documents is complex because they are issued by authorities at different levels, are published in a variety of forms, and have varying levels of juridical value or weight.
The article sets forth rules and principles to enable Catholic liturgists and others who work with ecclesiastical documents to assess the juridical value of such documents and see their relationship to each other. Huels proceeds to discuss these rules and principles in the context of four questions, which he emphasizes the interpreter of ecclesiastical documents must answer to assign proper weight to the documents: 1) Is the document theological or juridical in nature? 2) Who is the authority that has issued the document? 3) To whom is the document addressed? 4) Is the document juridically binding?
Once these four questions are answered, Huels says, the weight of the juridical documents will be clarified. One may then make a correct assessment of the document's juridical value. Huels concludes by reviewing four levels of differing value or weight: 1) legislative documents; 2) administrative documents given for the community; 3) administrative documents binding the executors of the law; and 4) non-binding documents.
Maxwell E. Johnson
Can We Avoid Relativism in Worship?
Liturgical Norms in the Light of Contemporary
Liturgical Scholarship, pp. 135 - 155.
Summary. Maxwell Johnson comments that recent studies of the origins of Christian worship make it increasingly difficult to argue in favor of anything that might be considered "normative" from the church's "classic" tradition for liturgy today. It seems, rather, that the Great Tradition is in constant flux and development with no single discernible common pattern, ritual contents, or theological interpretation.
With this observation, Johnson asks whether liturgy today is absolutely "relative" and based on subjective criteria of personal preference or choice, or whether a case can still be made for some kind of "normativity" based on the inherited traditions. Johnson offers what he deems a preliminary answer to these questions. He approaches his task by summarizing and critiquing the models for the study of liturgical theology suggested by Gordon Lathrop, James White, and Paul Bradshaw.
Based on his analysis, Johnson argues that not all is relative in terms of what the church does in liturgical celebrations and that a case can be made for some kind of "normativity" based on inherited traditions. He states further that there does not need to be only one homogeneous liturgical practice nor one interpretation of that practice, nor one model for liturgical theologians. He concludes that what is at stake in this question of liturgical "relativism" is the very identity and liturgical self-expression of classic orthodox Christianity, and that the goal is fidelity to God and the sacramental world view that defines and characterizes classic Christianity.
Richard J. Dillon
The "Priesthood" of St. Paul, Romans 15:15-16, pp. 156 - 168.
Summary. Richard Dillon notes that an intriguing fact about the letter to the Romans is that the circumstances it was intended to address are mentioned only at the beginning, in the standard thanksgiving paragraph (1:8-17), and the end (15:14-16:23), in Paul's concluding appeals to Rome's fast-growing Christian community. These two sections, Dillon says, are coherent with one another and with the letter-corpus in between. He adds that this coherence is important to the topic of the essay, that is, the liturgical language of Romans 15:16.
In his discussion of Romans 15:16, Dillon addresses the larger context from which the Apostle's commission to "preach the gospel" (1:15) obtains its significance for the letter's overall purpose. He then analyzes the liturgical language which unites Paul's characterizations of his preaching ministry in the introduction and epilogue to Romans. Finally, Dillon offers commentary on Romans 15:15-16. Specifically, Dillon suggests that vv. 15-16 declare the basis in the apostolic preaching charism for the strong instructional letter to Rome. Moreover, Paul's authority and legitimacy rest upon his special apostolic mandate to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, and the articulation of the mandate in vv. 15-16 picks up on the liturgical expressions given to it in 1:1 and 1:9.
Dillon concludes that the significance of the cultic terminology for Paul is that he was convinced that the salvation of the Gentiles would bring to fulfillment God's promises to Israel; but he also takes that barrier of ritual law separating Gentiles and Jews very seriously. Dillon argues that to overcome the legal structure which narrowly defined the sphere of the holy and precluded Gentile access to it, Paul's preaching is conceived as a liturgical purification of repentant Gentiles. This apostolate, Dillon says, qualifies as a real priestly ministry.
Gerard S. Sloyan
"Take Care," As Everyone Says Nowadays, pp. 168 - 173.
Summary. Gerard Sloyan identifies and offers solutions to certain pastoral problems, which he suggests are simply the result of negligence. In particular, Sloyan addresses the quality of the unleavened bread used for communion and urges that parishes buy tasty hosts of good size, which will, in turn, lift communicants' spirits.
Sloyan also focuses on the rite for communion under both kinds and notes that at present in most U.S. dioceses there is no restriction on when communion under both kinds may be made available. However, he notes that the infrequency of the practice is puzzling and distressing. Sloyan proposes that regularly offering the opportunity to people to take under both kinds and periodically preaching on the symbolism of Jesus' injunction to eat his body and drink his blood, would lead to increased use of the practice.
Finally, Sloyan comments on the widespread custom of distributing sacred hosts from the tabernacle that have been consecrated at a previous Mass. He reminds readers that tabernacles exist to reserve the Blessed Sacrament for the sick and dying. A secondary purpose in the West is to make available adoration outside the liturgical actio. Additionally, Sacrosanctum Concilium commends as "the more perfect form of participation in the Mass...the reception by the faithful of the Lord's body from the same sacrifice as the priest's communion" (§55). Sloyan proposes that resorting to already consecrated hosts can be avoided by simple planning.
Nathan D. Mitchell
The Amen Corner, pp. 173 - 182.
Summary. Nathan Mitchell writes that an insistence on the use of capital letters for certain nouns, i.e., "apostle" and "transubstantiation," has emerged as a pattern in Rome's recent reviews of English translations prepared by ICEL. In Mitchell's opinion, this insistence is not related to modern English orthography or customs of capitalization. Rather, Rome's objections to lower-case letters in the spelling of certain words in recent translations of the ordination prayers and still-contested revisions of the sacramentary and lectionary appear to be theological.
Mitchell attributes the growing obsession with the use of capital letters in English liturgical texts to a desire to reinforce traditional doctrinal orthodoxy - at least at the level of printed texts. He further believes that fears and obsessions surrounding orthodoxy ultimately erode faith and endanger "traditional doctrine," especially in the case of Eucharist. According to Mitchell, transubstantiation is a case in point. He proceeds to remind readers of what this familiar Catholic teaching does - and does not - mean.
In conclusion, Mitchell cautions that to treat sacramental language as though it were a litmus test of orthodoxy is manipulative, cynical and little short of sacrilegious. The language in question is God's gift to a pilgrim people. The language of the Eucharistic Prayer is not a platform for proclaiming dogmas; it is doxology whose goal is praise of God.
Book Reviews
Coming to Christ: A Study in Christian Eschatology. By Owen F. Cummings. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America 1998. Pages, 302. ISBN 0-7618-1223-7. Review by Michael Stoeber, pp. 184 - 185.
Creation out of Clay: The Ceramic Art and Writings of Brother Thomas. With a preface by Joan Chittister O.S.B., and photo essay by Bill Aron. Edited and compiled by Rosemary Williams. Boston, Massachusetts: Pucker Gallery/Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. 1999. Pages, 220. Hardcover, $80. ISBN 0-8028-3870-7. Review by R. Kevin Seasoltz, O.S.B., pp. 185 - 188.
Die Firmung: geschichtliche Entfaltung und theologischer Sinn. By Manfred Hauke. Paderborn: Bonifatius Druck Buch Verlag 1999. Pages, 524. Cloth. ISBN 3-89710-074-6. Review by Paul Turner, pp. 188 - 190.
Holy People: A Liturgical Ecclesiology. By Gordon W. Lathrop. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press 1999. Pages, ix + 246. Cloth, $29.00. ISBN 0-8006-3133-1. Review by John F. Baldovin, S.J., pp. 190 - 191.
Augustine through the Ages: An Encyclopedia. By Allan D. Fitzgerald O.S.A. as General Editor. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans 1999. Pages ii + 902. Hardcover, $75.00. ISBN 0-8028-3843-X. Review by R. Kevin Seasoltz, O.S.B., pp. 191 - 192.
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