Dialogue between the Church’s Memory, it Mind, and the New Order of Mass
Thesis: there is not one Locus Theologicus (the Papacy) but Many: Scripture, Tradition, Liturgy, Fathers, Councils, History, Reason, and the Living Magisterium
Characters:
The Memory of the Church[1]
The Mind of the Church[2]
The New Missal
The Pope[3]
The Theologian[4]
THE NEW MISSAL (the Order of Mass of 1969): Here I am! I have been promulgated! I am now a law of prayer (lex orandi) of the Church.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Who are you?
THE NEW MISSAL: “I am the assembly (synaxis) of the People of God. I am the memorial of the Lord. I am the gathering of the faithful.”
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: That is true enough as far as it goes. But are you only that?
THE NEW MISSAL: Why do you ask?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Because I remember you differently. I remember: the Roman Canon without omissions, truncations, and innovations; St. Ambrose; St. Leo; Gregory; sacrifice; altar; oblation. I have long heard Masses and liturgies speak of their definitions and description of what you ought to call yourself to be a member of their species. Yet, I do not hear everything from you as I remember what you must be to be among them.
THE NEW MISSAL: Do you condemn me?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Not exactly, but I cannot not yet fully recognize you. A kind of surgery is needed, so that your form may express more clearly what I have always remembered about the Mass.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: I have heard both of you. Missal, what you say is true. The Mass is indeed an assembly. But Memory is also correct. The Mass is also a sacrifice.
THE NEW MISSAL: Then what will you do?
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: I will not destroy you. I will not reject you. But I will require you to explain yourself more fully.
THE NEW MISSAL: Why?
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Because your initial description is insufficient to express the whole memory of the Church.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: I am not the law. I am not the judge. But I am memory. And I am mindful of many past monuments, whether they come from the papacy or from the many other witnesses of the Church.
THE NEW MISSAL: Then I shall be changed?
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Yes. Your form must be brought into conformity with the memory of the Church.
(The Theologian enters.)
THE THEOLOGIAN: Now I understand. This was never a dispute about validity.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: No.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Nor about legality.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: No.
THE THEOLOGIAN: But about true identity.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Exactly.
(The Pope enters, as the judging organ through which the Church’s mind approaches her
memory.)
THE POPE: And where do I stand in all this?
THE THEOLOGIAN: Are you the Mind of the Church?
THE POPE: Not simply.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Are you the Memory of the Church?
THE POPE: By no means.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Then what are you?
THE POPE: I am a minister. I am a guardian. I am the minister and interpreter of the Church’s memory.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: I am older than you, O man: “You made him a little lower than the angels; you crowned him with glory and honor.”
THE POPE: I know.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: And I shall remain after you.
THE POPE: I know.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Yet without the Pope I cannot preserve unity.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: And without me you could neither remember nor understand what you are.
THE POPE: Then we labor together.
THE THEOLOGIAN: So the Pope, considered individually, is not a monument?
THE POPE: No.
THE THEOLOGIAN: But he creates monuments?
THE POPE: Yes.
THE THEOLOGIAN: And those monuments enter the memory of the Church?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Yes. And I receive them and preserve them until the consummation of the age.
THE THEOLOGIAN: And what happens after their preservation and protection?
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: There can arise a more subtle interpretation. A new judgment and even new monuments bringing forth treasures “new and old”.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Then the Church is not a museum.
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: No.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Nor is she merely the will of the present moment.
THE POPE: No.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Then what is she?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Tradition.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Understanding.
THE POPE: Unity.
THE NEW MISSAL: And what of me?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: You shall be received into the Church’s memory, once your form has been clarified.
THE NEW MISSAL: And if I do not express myself clearly enough?
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Then memory will continue to question you.
THE NEW MISSAL: And if something is lacking in me?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: That does not trouble me. I live longer than you.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Then what is the greatest error?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: Forgetfulness.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: Voluntarism without memory.
THE POPE: Separating judgment from memory.
THE THEOLOGIAN: Then what is wisdom here to be gained?
THE MEMORY OF THE CHURCH: To remember.
THE MIND OF THE CHURCH: To understand.
THE POPE: To discern what is either true or probable, and to serve it faithfully, each in accord with its proper rank.
FINIS
[1] These are the loci theologici which are, so to, speak ten (according to Cano): Proper Theological Sources (Inward/Intrinsic) 1.) Sacred Scripture (The written Word of God) 2.) Apostolic Traditions (The unwritten Tradition) + Liturgy 3.) the Catholic Church (The universal consensus of the Church) 4). the Councils (The ecumenical and authoritative assemblies) 5.) the Roman Church (The Apostolic See / The Papacy) 6.) the Holy Fathers (The early Patristic witnesses) 7.) the Scholastic Theologians and Canonists (The systematic and legal doctors) and Foreign Theological Sources (Outward/Extrinsic) 8.) Natural Reason (The capacity of human intellect) 9.) Philosophers (Natural philosophy and metaphysical thought) 10.) Human History (Historical records and human experience).
[2] These are the organs of thought of the church: living congregations imbued with teaching authority under the pontiff, the pontiff’s writings and allocutions, the synods and councils as living an whose documents are approvied
[3] This was Paul VI but can be any post-Vatican II pope
[4] This is a Dominican appointed in succession for hundreds of years to ideally provide Thomistic grammar and guardrails to vatican publications and allocutions.
