Arinze on Liturgy

I recently read an article which discussed the Homily by Francis Cardinal Arinze at the closing of the plenary assembly of the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences. I quote first from the article.

Cardinal Arinze exhorted the continent’s bishops to follow the Church’s norms for liturgical inculturation, so that “the local Church will be spared questionable or downright mistaken innovations and idiosyncrasies of some enthusiastic cleric whose fertile imaginations invents something on Saturday night and whose uninformed zeal forces this innovation on the innocent congregation on Sunday morning.”

“Dance in particular needs to be critically examined because most dances draw attention to the performers and offer enjoyment,” he continued. “People come to Mass, not for recreation but, to adore God, to praise and thank him, to ask pardon for their sins, and to request other spiritual and temporal needs. The monasteries may be of help in how graceful body movements can become prayer.”

Digging deeper, I was able to find the actual text of the homily, unfortunately in PDF format only. It is a good read, and I recommend reading the whole thing. Here I extract some of the most salient bits. (My emphasis and [comments])

Adoration manifests itself in such gestures in genuflection, deep bow, kneeling, prostration and silence in the presence of the Lord. Asian cultures have a deep sense of the sacred and transcendent. Reverence in Asia to civil authorities sometimes shows itself in clasped hands, kneeling, bows, prostration and walking away while facing a dignitary. It should not be too difficult to bring and elevate this cultural value to honour our Eucharistic Jesus. The fashion in some parts of the world of not installing kneelers in churches should not be copied by the Church in Asia. The Holy Eucharist is the summit of the sacred in our worship.

The ars celebrandi is the art of proper celebration. It is a fruit of faithful adherence to liturgical norms in all their richness and assistants. When the Eucharistic celebration is properly carried out, it manifests the Eucharistic faith of the Church; it nourishes the faith of the participants; and it sends them home on fire to live and share the faith.

The way in which Holy Communion is distributed should be clearly indicated and monitored and individual idiosyncrasies should not be allowed. In the Latin Rite, only concelebrating priests take Holy Communion. Everyone else is given, be the person cleric or lay. It is not right that the priest discard any of the vestments just because the climate is hot or humid. If necessary, the Bishop can arrange the use of lighter cloth. It is altogether unacceptable that the celebrant will opt for local dress in the place of universally approved Mass vestments or use baskets, or wine glasses to distribute the Holy Eucharist. This is inculturation wrongly understood.

If these directives are followed, the local Church will be spared [a good way to put it] questionable or downright mistaken innovations and idiosyncrasies of some enthusiastic cleric whose fertile imagination invents something on Saturday night and whose uninformed zeal forces this innovation on the innocent congregation on Sunday morning. [Doesn't it feel like that sometimes?]

Dance in particular needs to be critically examined because most dances draw attention to the performers and offer enjoyment. [The casual reader will note that he is pointing out that this is a bad thing.]

People come to Mass, not for recreation but, to adore God, to praise and thank him, to ask pardon for their sins, and to request other spiritual and temporal needs. The monasteries may be of help in how graceful body movements can become prayer. The Colombo statement quoted above remarks: “When pastoral zeal combines with cultural and religious sensitivity, new ground is broken. On the contrary, hasty and un‐reflected changes weaken or damage the religious significance and life‐transforming power of worship” (Colombo Statement, 6).

I think this should be more widely read than simply among the Asian Bishops.