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Liturgy Made Simple
The presumed "mystery" of liturgical functions is swept away as Searle gives basic, practical steps leading to an effective liturgy.
96 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1981
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March 22, 2023
A BRIEF AND USEFUL OVERVIEW OF MATTERS OF CATHOLIC LITURGY
Author Mark Searle wrote in the Introduction to this 1981 book, “there are many Catholics who have lived with the liturgy for a lifetime and yet have never really been introduced to it, with the result that they have never… come to know it… It has always seemed somewhat remote and unapproachable and beyond their comprehension. In the old days, that did not seem to matter very much… Then came Vatican II. Laypeople, as often as not, were dragged into the conversation… This book is designed to ‘break the ice.’ It originated in four talks given at the Notre Dame Center for Pastoral Liturgy, talks designed for parishioners who found themselves called upon to take an active role in the planning and celebration of parish worship, but who felt that they did not really understand what it was all about…. It is to be hoped that the reader will be led to move … beyond a preoccupation with liturgical planning and performance to a deeper life lived within the mysteries we celebrate.”
In the first chapter, he explains, “Mention the word ‘Mass’ and some people think of quiet moments in a dark church with the priest afar off quietly muttering the words of ancient Latin… Others think of guitars and joyful noise… Others think of a small gathering of friends and neighbors in someone’s house for a careful reading of the Scriptures, for spontaneous prayer, and for intimate sharing of the one bread and the one cup… For others still, Mass is something you have to attend if you are a Catholic: just that and no more… but it is n a particular parish on a Sunday morning that out of all these rubrics and directives … a community has to come to common worship, finding itself gathered together in the Spirit of Jesus before the presence of the Father. There the arguments have to cease… and common prayer has to rise up before the throne of God. Decisions have to be made on how we can all celebrate together… Celebrating THIS liturgy requires some consensus on what liturgy is for and what it means to be Church.” (Pg. 12-13)
He notes, “even in the time that the Church has existed, it has never represented the religion of the majority of the human race. This has never really struck home until this century. Previously, Christians believed the world to be more or less evangelized… they were either ignorant of, or blind to, the existence of whole races and cultures living outside that world… Only in this century have we come to realize… that most people on this earth have never been members of the Church and … its adherents still represent a minority of the human race. This realization leads us to a more humble estimate of the success of Christianity and its role in history... [This] raises all sorts of questions, not only about how the unbaptized can be saved outside the Church… then what is the Church for? If the Church is not absolutely necessary for salvation, what it is for at all? Such questions have… many ramifications in parish life as well.” (Pg. 14-16)
He continues, “The Church cannot regard herself as simply ‘having the goods’ ready to hand out, as if salvation were some kind of supernatural commodity. On the contrary, she is to be a sign of redemption in a world in process of being redeemed… the Church… is part of the world and is itself in continual need of God’s redemptive grace and of conversion and reform in response to that grace.” (Pg. 18-19)
He explains, “The liturgy is really nothing else than the celebration of that ongoing process of redemption in and of the world…. it is in that liturgical celebration that that same pattern of initiative and response, of divine action and human cooperation, which underlies all Christian life, comes to its most explicit expression.” (Pg. 19)
He states, “Vatican II undertook the reform of the liturgy… The rubrics of the Old Mass, as they were fixed in the sixteenth century, were exclusively concerned with the priest… [In the 1969 revision] the Order of Mass with a Congregation is made normative, and much is made of the people as a whole and of the various ministries within the assembly. Nevertheless, if in the past the liturgy became somewhat highly formal and individualistic, the danger today is perhaps that it often risks becoming a sort of churchy hoe-down. In reaction against the timelessness and otherworldliness of the old liturgy… some groups tur liturgical celebrations into affirmations of life and faith which are often too flimsy and too superficial to be sustaining. Many parishes have found that the youth Masses which attracted such enthusiasm a few years ago are now becoming stereotyped and boring…” (Pg. 22-24)
He observes, “If there is one thing that stands in the way of people understanding the Mass, it is the feeling that the Mass consists of just one thing coming after another, with no apparent rhyme or reason... Another way of putting this is to ask: what are we trying to do? Is the Liturgy of the Word meant to be a period of religious instruction or edification? … This is the Word of the Lord: not instruction about God, but … the Word addressed to us by God himself.” (Pg. 38)
He states, “the Eucharist is not just a sacred rite to be celebrated because of its good effects. It is rather an act of remembering God and his Christ, and of remembering in such a way that we are drawn to give ourselves anew to God and to our neighbors, as Jesus on that first occasion was committing himself to his Father for the sake of the world he loved.” (Pg. 56)
He explains, “The breaking of bread … was not just a nice idea for the early Christians. It is a profound truth: a sign of the unity given us in Christ, a unity which triumphs over all human differences, prejudices, and inequalities. A sacrament is not just an empty sign… The breaking of bread is a sacramental sign of the irrelevance of our divisions and classes. It MAKES them irrelevant.” (Pg. 67)
He explains, “Active participation in the liturgy was one of the battle cries of the liturgical movement and one of the guiding principles of liturgical reform. It is rooted in the fact that God… is creating a people for himself, to witness… in the midst of a divided and antagonistic world … we are discovering… the corresponding attitudes and acquire a sense of ourselves as a people. Until that does happen, however, the liturgy will never quite come alive.” (Pg. 90)
This is a very helpful and ‘mainstream’ introduction to contemporary Catholic liturgy.
Author Mark Searle wrote in the Introduction to this 1981 book, “there are many Catholics who have lived with the liturgy for a lifetime and yet have never really been introduced to it, with the result that they have never… come to know it… It has always seemed somewhat remote and unapproachable and beyond their comprehension. In the old days, that did not seem to matter very much… Then came Vatican II. Laypeople, as often as not, were dragged into the conversation… This book is designed to ‘break the ice.’ It originated in four talks given at the Notre Dame Center for Pastoral Liturgy, talks designed for parishioners who found themselves called upon to take an active role in the planning and celebration of parish worship, but who felt that they did not really understand what it was all about…. It is to be hoped that the reader will be led to move … beyond a preoccupation with liturgical planning and performance to a deeper life lived within the mysteries we celebrate.”
In the first chapter, he explains, “Mention the word ‘Mass’ and some people think of quiet moments in a dark church with the priest afar off quietly muttering the words of ancient Latin… Others think of guitars and joyful noise… Others think of a small gathering of friends and neighbors in someone’s house for a careful reading of the Scriptures, for spontaneous prayer, and for intimate sharing of the one bread and the one cup… For others still, Mass is something you have to attend if you are a Catholic: just that and no more… but it is n a particular parish on a Sunday morning that out of all these rubrics and directives … a community has to come to common worship, finding itself gathered together in the Spirit of Jesus before the presence of the Father. There the arguments have to cease… and common prayer has to rise up before the throne of God. Decisions have to be made on how we can all celebrate together… Celebrating THIS liturgy requires some consensus on what liturgy is for and what it means to be Church.” (Pg. 12-13)
He notes, “even in the time that the Church has existed, it has never represented the religion of the majority of the human race. This has never really struck home until this century. Previously, Christians believed the world to be more or less evangelized… they were either ignorant of, or blind to, the existence of whole races and cultures living outside that world… Only in this century have we come to realize… that most people on this earth have never been members of the Church and … its adherents still represent a minority of the human race. This realization leads us to a more humble estimate of the success of Christianity and its role in history... [This] raises all sorts of questions, not only about how the unbaptized can be saved outside the Church… then what is the Church for? If the Church is not absolutely necessary for salvation, what it is for at all? Such questions have… many ramifications in parish life as well.” (Pg. 14-16)
He continues, “The Church cannot regard herself as simply ‘having the goods’ ready to hand out, as if salvation were some kind of supernatural commodity. On the contrary, she is to be a sign of redemption in a world in process of being redeemed… the Church… is part of the world and is itself in continual need of God’s redemptive grace and of conversion and reform in response to that grace.” (Pg. 18-19)
He explains, “The liturgy is really nothing else than the celebration of that ongoing process of redemption in and of the world…. it is in that liturgical celebration that that same pattern of initiative and response, of divine action and human cooperation, which underlies all Christian life, comes to its most explicit expression.” (Pg. 19)
He states, “Vatican II undertook the reform of the liturgy… The rubrics of the Old Mass, as they were fixed in the sixteenth century, were exclusively concerned with the priest… [In the 1969 revision] the Order of Mass with a Congregation is made normative, and much is made of the people as a whole and of the various ministries within the assembly. Nevertheless, if in the past the liturgy became somewhat highly formal and individualistic, the danger today is perhaps that it often risks becoming a sort of churchy hoe-down. In reaction against the timelessness and otherworldliness of the old liturgy… some groups tur liturgical celebrations into affirmations of life and faith which are often too flimsy and too superficial to be sustaining. Many parishes have found that the youth Masses which attracted such enthusiasm a few years ago are now becoming stereotyped and boring…” (Pg. 22-24)
He observes, “If there is one thing that stands in the way of people understanding the Mass, it is the feeling that the Mass consists of just one thing coming after another, with no apparent rhyme or reason... Another way of putting this is to ask: what are we trying to do? Is the Liturgy of the Word meant to be a period of religious instruction or edification? … This is the Word of the Lord: not instruction about God, but … the Word addressed to us by God himself.” (Pg. 38)
He states, “the Eucharist is not just a sacred rite to be celebrated because of its good effects. It is rather an act of remembering God and his Christ, and of remembering in such a way that we are drawn to give ourselves anew to God and to our neighbors, as Jesus on that first occasion was committing himself to his Father for the sake of the world he loved.” (Pg. 56)
He explains, “The breaking of bread … was not just a nice idea for the early Christians. It is a profound truth: a sign of the unity given us in Christ, a unity which triumphs over all human differences, prejudices, and inequalities. A sacrament is not just an empty sign… The breaking of bread is a sacramental sign of the irrelevance of our divisions and classes. It MAKES them irrelevant.” (Pg. 67)
He explains, “Active participation in the liturgy was one of the battle cries of the liturgical movement and one of the guiding principles of liturgical reform. It is rooted in the fact that God… is creating a people for himself, to witness… in the midst of a divided and antagonistic world … we are discovering… the corresponding attitudes and acquire a sense of ourselves as a people. Until that does happen, however, the liturgy will never quite come alive.” (Pg. 90)
This is a very helpful and ‘mainstream’ introduction to contemporary Catholic liturgy.
December 14, 2011
Written in 1981, a few areas are a bit out of date now considering the newer General Instruction on the Roman Missal, and the Roman Missal III recently promulgated. However, there is still much good to be found within if one keeps in mind the age of the book and the era in which it was written 30 years ago is a bit different now in most dioceses and parishes.
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