Wednesday, August 04, 2010

Archbishop Koch: Vatican II meant Mass facing East & in Latin

Excerpts from an interview granted by the new President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Archbishop Kurt Koch, to Gaudium Press, posted by Rorate Caeli, "Archbishop Koch: Sacrosanctum Concilium meant Mass ad orientem and in Latin" (July 30, 2010):
All those things that some people say that was new after the Second Vatican Council were not a theme of the Constitution on the Liturgy [Sacrosanctum Concilium]. For instance, celebrating the Eucharist facing the faithful was never an object of Tradition.... The second thing was the vernacular language. The Council wished that Latin remain the language of the liturgy.

Yet all those very deep, fundamental, things of the liturgical Constitution, are still ignored by many. For instance, the entire liturgy and the Paschal liturgy.... One cannot celebrate the Paschal [mystery] without sacrifice, and that is the theme that is mentioned in theology. Because the Constitution on Revelation [Dei Verbum] is not yet known in the Church either. We still have much to do in order to receive the Council.
This still leaves unexplored the question as to what the Concilium and Abp. Bugnini were up to; but that's another story.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

For what it's worth, I'm currently rereading "Windswept House" again after nearly 15 years. Malachi Martin clearly accepts the theory of "Liturgical Time Bombs". The Archbishop doesn't, apparently. Or perhaps he intends us to understand the explicit portions of the text instead of the squidgy ones?