Should a priest regularly celebrate the holy mysteries in more than one liturgical rite?

By Fr Ephraem Chifley OP

Stepping back from the trials and tribulations which recently have beset the Fraternity of St Peter in its relations with Roman officialdom, Fr Ephraem Chifley OP, reflects on the implications, and contradictions, inherent in the bi-ritualist trend of official Church liturgical policy.

The shortage of priests in most western countries constitutes a serious pastoral problem. It is no wonder that bishops are always on the look out for priests of whatever other rite to say the New Mass in their parishes. This is an understandable though misguided policy - clearly an instance of a hard case making a bad pastoral policy. It fails to ask questions about the cause of the shortage in the first place and it is surely not too simplistic to suggest that the collapse of priestly identity and the consequent decline in the numbers of young men seeking a priestly vocation might have something to do with the way in which general liturgical practice (as distinct from the new missal) undercuts the unique role of the priest.

There is, however, a prior question. Should a priest regularly celebrate the holy mysteries in more than one liturgical rite? This question arises not only for traditional priests who have an attachment to the Pian Rite (the Rite of Pius V - the 1962 Missal) and are asked by their bishops or superiors to use the Pauline Rite (the Rite of Paul VI - the 1969 Missal) but also for priests of the oriental rites in countries that are predominantly Latin rite. It is not primarily a question of whether or not one rite is better than another but whether the business of frequently swapping rites is pastorally and theologically sound and whether is it good for the priest and the people he serves.

Spiritual schizophrenia

The Congregation for Divine Worship suggested recently that there could be no question of “bi-ritualism” for priests who celebrated both the Pian Rite and the Pauline Rite. According to the Congregation these two are both the same rite. This is true in the narrow legalistic sense that there is no separate jurisdiction for those who are attached to the Pian Rite. The “traditional movement” is not a separate ritual church like the Maronites or Ukrainians, much as some people would like it to occupy that canonical position. It is not, however, just a case of different “ways of saying Mass”.

If it were just a question of rubrical niceties then people would not object to the Pian Rite as vigorously as they do. It is a plainly different liturgical reality which stresses different and clearly inconvenient things about the Church. A disinterested observer would have to concede that the average Sunday Mass in the Pauline Rite in the average Novus Ordo parish is as different from the average Sunday Mass in the Pian Rite in the average traditional parish as it is from Mass in the average Byzantine parish. In fact the latter two probably have much more in common with one another. I have heard Greek Orthodox people say after coming to Solemn Mass in the Pian Rite that it is “just like ours”. We do not need to enter into discussion as to which one we ought to prefer. We must, however, as a matter of intellectual honesty acknowledge that there is an actual liturgical diversity.

The adoption, therefore, by some priests and laity of the Pian Rite represents a profound acculturation by them to a different form of liturgical and spiritual life from that legitimately practiced by the rest of the Church, just as the Copts or Chaldaeans have their unique patrimony. One cannot shift easily between such contrasting cultural and psychological realities. As one old Anglican bishop put it to a friend of mine, “saying Mass in two different rites is a sure way of going very mad, very quickly”. Bi-ritualism is spiritually schizophrenic.

One would never expect a Test Cricket Batter to spend his days away from the SCG winning a tennis tournament or playing ruck rover for Essendon. When I was a lad I played the trombone reasonably proficiently. My music teacher strictly forbade me to play a trumpet or cornet. The mouth of brass player changes its shape to suit the instrument. Having adapted to one, the other was ruled out. An action as complex and habitual as that of a liturgical rite requires us to change to harmonize with its unique contours.

In order to assert that “bi-ritualism” should be an accepted general practice one has to accept an account of the liturgy which is fundamentally rationalist. If the liturgy is primarily an intellectual reality - words on the page - then a priest can say one set of words one day and different words the next. The bodily and habitual aspects of rite are discounted in favour of the purely cerebral. It must be considered ironic that this view of the liturgy principally as a read text is one that both the pre- and post-conciliar liturgical movement sought to weaken.

It used to be called rubricism and it was blamed for all sorts of things. But a priest or layman who adopts the Pian Rite becomes implicated in more than using a particular liturgical text. He develops attitudes of mind and spirit which flow from his immersion in that rite. He will manifest a particular theological and spiritual perspective different from that of people who celebrate other rites. To suggest that the vast majority of priests and people might move easily between profoundly different ritual realities involves a view of the human person that is startlingly unsophisticated, and quite frankly not a little authoritarian.

Church magnanimous

The Church is entering uncharted waters. We have little idea of what will happen next. The cultural upheavals of the 1960’s have left many in the Church marginalised. But surely a Church of a billion people is magnanimous enough to make room for a variety of cultural liturgical expressions of its faith, including that represented by the growing numbers who celebrate the Pian Rite. For the first time cultural difference is not based principally on region or language. Divergent cultural reactions to the rapid social change of the last century bisect lines of class, language, geography or ethnic origin and have become focussed, in the Church at least, around the celebration of the liturgy.

It is of fundamental importance to the Church’s evangelical endeavour that this cultural diversity is acknowledged and turned to advantage rather than becoming a source of sterile controversy for yet another generation. It is time that those whose attitudes were formed in the theological debates of the 1960’s realised that those categories are no longer relevant for the task ahead of the Church in the 21^st century.

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