The Concept of Liturgical Reform in the Writings of Romano Guardini and Joseph Ratzinger / Pope Benedict XVI: A Comparative Analysis Róbert Kürnyek Thesis submitted to the Faculty of Theology, Saint Paul University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctorate of Philosophy degree in Theology Ottawa, Canada 2016 © Róbert Kürnyek, Ottawa, Canada, 2016 TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS _________________________________________________________ 1 SIGLA AND ABBREVIATIONS ___________________________________________________ 3 INTRODUCTION _______________________________________________________________ 4 1. LITURGY AND THEOLOGY: CONNECTION AND DEVELOPMENT ______________ 10 1.1 SHIFT IN THE INTERPRETATION OF PROSPER ’S ADAGE _______________________________ 12 1.1.1 The Original Meaning of Prosper of Aquitaine’s Adage _________________________ 15 1.1.2 Lex Orandi – Lex Credendi in Pope Pius XII’s Encyclical Mediator Dei ____________ 18 1.1.2.1 The Teaching of the Encyclical _______________________________________________ 18 1.1.2.2 Liturgical and Theological Consequences _______________________________________ 21 1.1.3 The Understanding of Prosper’s Adage in the Liturgical Movement _______________ 25 1.1.4 Liturgy and Theology in the Time of the Liturgical Reform of Vatican II ____________ 29 1.2 THEOLOGY AND LITURGY BY ROMANO GUARDINI _________________________________ 33 1.2.1 An Important Category: Der Gegensatz _____________________________________ 33 1.2.2 References to Liturgy and Theology ________________________________________ 36 1.3 LITURGY AND THEOLOGY BY JOSEPH RATZINGER __________________________________ 40 1.3.1 The Meaning of Theology ________________________________________________ 40 1.3.2 Theology, Magisterium and Liturgy ________________________________________ 48 1.4 CONCLUSION OF CHAPTER 1 __________________________________________________ 53 2. THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL TURN IN ROMANO GUARDINI’S INTERPRETATION OF LITURGICAL REFORM ____________________________________________________________ 56 2.1 FALSE PATHS OF LITURGICAL RENEWAL : THE 1940 LETTER EIN WORT ZUR LITURGISCHEN FRAGE __________________________________________________________________________ 57 2.1.1 Liturgicism: Liturgy for the Sake of Liturgy __________________________________ 60 2.1.2 Dilettantism: Liturgical One-Sidedness _____________________________________ 62 2.1.3 Pragmatism: Realizing Only the Doable _____________________________________ 65 2.1.4 Conservatism: Inaccurate Concept of History and Development __________________ 66 2.1.5 Elements of Liturgical Renewal ___________________________________________ 69 2.2 ENABLED TO PERFORM THE LITURGICAL ACT : THE LETTER DER KULTAKT UND DIE GEGENWÄRTIGE AUFGABE DER LITURGISCHEN BILDUNG 1964 _________________________________ 71 2.2.1 Rediscovering the Centrality of the Liturgical Act _____________________________ 72 2.2.2 Consequences of Guardini’s Approach ______________________________________ 75 2.3 LITURGICAL FORMATION AS THE KERNEL OF LITURGICAL REFORM ____________________ 80 2.3.1 Recognition of the Connection between Spiritual and Material Existence ___________ 81 2.3.2 The Recovery of the Interrelationship between Human Being and Things ___________ 86 2.3.3 Living out the Tension between Individual and Community in the Liturgy ___________ 88 2.3.4 Maintaining the Objective Character of the Liturgy ____________________________ 93 2.3.5 Allowing Culture to Influence Religion ______________________________________ 97 2.4 REFORM IN LITURGICAL PRAXIS _______________________________________________ 99 2.5 A CONCLUDING WORD ON LITURGICAL FORMATION ______________________________ 103 3. JOSEPH RATZINGER AND THE NEW LITURGICAL MOVEMENT ______________ 108 3.1 ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE VATICAN II LITURGICAL REFORM __________________ 111 3.1.1 Position on the Liturgical Reform _________________________________________ 112 3.1.2 Reasons for the Unsuccessful Implementation _______________________________ 123 3.2 RATZINGER ’S PROPOSALS FOR A LITURGICAL RENEWAL ____________________________ 134 3.2.1 Principles of Liturgical Renewal __________________________________________ 135 3.2.2 Renewal of the Liturgical Awareness: Liturgical Formation ____________________ 141 Table of Contents 2 3.2.3 Renewal in Praxis _____________________________________________________ 145 3.3 POPE BENEDICT XVI’ S LITURGICAL PRAXIS _____________________________________ 151 3.4 CONCLUSION OF CHAPTER 3 _________________________________________________ 155 4. THE CRITERIA FOR LITURGICAL REFORM _________________________________ 158 4.1 ON THE ESSENCE OF LITURGY ________________________________________________ 160 4.1.1 The Subject of the Liturgy _______________________________________________ 163 4.1.2 The Church __________________________________________________________ 167 4.1.3 The Individual-Community Relation _______________________________________ 173 4.1.4 Objectivity and Subjectivity in the Liturgy __________________________________ 179 4.1.5 A Concluding Word on the Liturgy ________________________________________ 185 4.2 CRITERIA FOR THE REFORM OF THE LITURGY ____________________________________ 186 4.2.1 Guardini’s Criteria ____________________________________________________ 189 4.2.1.1 Liturgical Reform Is Formation ______________________________________________ 190 4.2.1.2 Liturgical Reform Acknowledges the Human ___________________________________ 190 4.2.1.3 Liturgical Reform Operates on Communitarian Level _____________________________ 191 4.2.1.4 The Objective Character of Liturgy to be Maintained _____________________________ 191 4.2.1.5 Liturgical Reform Must Concentrate on the Liturgical Act _________________________ 192 4.2.1.6 Appreciation of Interconnected Elements _______________________________________ 192 4.2.2 Ratzinger’s Criteria ____________________________________________________ 193 4.2.2.1 Having a Clear Understanding of the Church’s Faith ______________________________ 194 4.2.2.2 Finding the Real Subject of the Liturgy: Christ __________________________________ 195 4.2.2.3 Faithfulness to History, Tradition, and Organic Development _______________________ 196 4.2.2.4 Understanding of the Nature of the Liturgy _____________________________________ 197 4.2.2.5 Liturgical Reform Means Formation __________________________________________ 197 4.3 CONCLUSION OF CHAPTER 4 _________________________________________________ 198 5. FROM LITURGICAL REFORM TO LITURGICAL PRAXIS ______________________ 201 5.1 THE FUTURE OF THE ROMAN RITE AND ITS EXTRAORDINARY FORM ___________________ 203 5.1.1 The Coexistence of the Two Forms of the Roman Rite _________________________ 205 5.1.2 Pre-Conciliar Liturgy in the Context of a Post-Conciliar Theology _______________ 208 5.2 THE FUTURE OF THE ORDINARY FORM _________________________________________ 213 5.3 NEED FOR A REFORM OF THE REFORM ? _________________________________________ 219 CONCLUSION _______________________________________________________________ 227 BIBLIOGRAPHY _____________________________________________________________ 233 SIGLA AND ABBREVIATIONS CSEL Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum FThS Freiburger Theologische Studien HK Herder Korrespondenz JLW Jahrbuch für Liturgiewissenschaft LG Lumen Gentium LJ Liturgisches Jahrbuch LMD La Maison-Dieu PL Patrologia Latina RPL Rivista di pastorale liturgica SC Sacrosanctum Concilium SL Studia Liturgica SPL Studia Patristica et Liturgica StdZ Stimmen der Zeit INTRODUCTION The observer is often lost among the many attempts to define the relationship between the theology of the liturgy and liturgical praxis. This discussion—a debating point in contemporary theological discussion—expanded in 2007, the year of the publication of Summorum Pontificum , an Apostolic Letter on the connection between the ordinary and the extraordinary forms of the Roman Rite and thus on the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council. The debate is not merely about the differences between theological and liturgical ideas or how liturgy is interpreted by different theologians or liturgists. It is rather how the Church sees and understands liturgy in its own life and how it refers to the liturgical reform of the Council. It seems that the liturgical discussion has become extremely polarized, as if it would be the proving ground for the origins of the teaching of the Council. There are those who completely reject the liturgical reform of the Council: the Society of Pius X, for example. However, even inside the Catholic Church one can find both a desire for a major liberalization of the liturgy that will free it from all significant boundaries and rubrics, thereby adjusting it to the needs of the concrete celebrating community, and a desire for strict liturgical exactness to guarantee the preservation of the traditional and transcendental character of liturgy. Naturally, there are several other positions between these two extremes, but it seems that these two extremes dominate liturgical theological discussion. I am convinced that this is not merely a problem affecting the first decades of the twenty-first century, but that it is a general problem for Introduction 5 the future—that of deciding what liturgy is and how we should evaluate the liturgical reform of Vatican II. In this present work I intend to offer the examples of two great thinkers of the twentieth century: Romano Guardini and Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI. Joseph Ratzinger’s theology of the liturgy evokes considerable debate in contemporary