Before Sacra Liturgia, Bishop Rey explains why liturgy matters

On Tuesday, Bishop Dominique Rey gave an update about the Sacra Liturgia conference taking place next month in Rome. There are some interesting points he made which make this conference of special importance to anyone with some interest in the liturgy and its celebration. And, to be honest, as Catholics we all do, whether we’re aware of that or not. But let’s let the good bishop explain (with some emphases by me):

“Thank you for your presence this evening.

Sacra Liturgia 2013 is an event that follows on from the Adoratio 2011 Conference that I organised at the Salesianum in Rome two years ago. Inspired by the Year of Faith called to mark the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council and following on from the Synod on the New Evangelisation, I wanted to bring together key cardinals, bishops and other noted experts in the liturgy from around the world to underline the fact that formation in the sacred liturgy and its correct celebration is of the first importance in the life and mission of the Church.

I would like to emphasise this point: grace has a primacy in all our activities. The liturgy is the continuing action of Jesus Christ in His Church. It is where we encounter Christ and receive the power of the Holy Spirit to strengthen us for Christian life and mission. The New Evangelisation must be founded on the worthy celebration of the liturgy, and for that we need good liturgical formation.

This event was also inspired by the liturgical teaching of Benedict XVI. We are holding the conference in Rome, at the Pontifical University Santa Croce, in order to be close to Peter, and our delegates hope to join with our new Holy Father, Pope Francis, at the Mass of Saints Peter and Paul in St Peter’s Basilica.

The conference itself will be a time of shared reflection, study and celebration on different aspects of the liturgy and the mission of the Church. The programme is published on the conference website, but I would highlight the Keynote address of His Eminence Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith: “The Sacred Liturgy, culmen et fons vitæ et missionis ecclesiæ” which will in many ways set the tone for the different and specific presentations that will follow.

The liturgical celebrations of Vespers and Holy Mass in the Basilica of St Apollinare will be in both forms of the Roman rite: there does not need to be any opposition between the two. The correct celebration of both have their rightful place in the Church of the New Evangelisation.

At this time we expect delegates from approximately 25 different countries. They include bishops, priests, deacons, seminarians and religious as well as lay men and women. Facilities will be available for delegates to listen to translations in French, English, Italian, Spanish and German. There is more information on the conference website www.sacraliturgia.com in each of those languages…”

Liturgy. Important stuff.

Cardinal Ranjith will give his address on the first day, in the evening of 25 June, with only the celebration of Vespers and the introduction, both by Bishop Rey, preceding it. The Latin bit of the title of this address means “source and summit of the life and mission of the Church”: an apt description of the liturgy from which many other topics flow.

It looks like Bishop Rey has a very clear purpose with this conference. I think it’s therefore apt to start a short series of profiles on some of the speakers with him. Hopefully I’ll be able to get it out sometime tomorrow morning.

Lastly, for those wondering why I choose to pay such specific attention to this conference: firstly, I myself am interested in the liturgy, so this conference is quite up my alley, and secondly, I was asked to do so. I am quite happy to respond to such request, and grateful that my little blog has apparently been noticed enough to warrant such a request.

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Bootcamp 2011: The (Good) Shepherd

I am back from two days (and a bit) at the latest edition of the Credimus Bootcamp, an undeservedly shortened edition this time. Next year is the fifth edition, and this potentially week-long camp of Catholic catechesis, culture and enjoyment will hopefully have a record number of attendants then. I will certainly be there again.

This year’s speakers were a diverse bunch, even though the general theme was that of the shepherd: the Good Shepherd that is Jesus Christ, but also our every day shepherds, the bishops, the shepherd of the world Church, the pope and some of his predecessors, and the shepherd’s duty of taking care of his sheep.

Fr. Bunschoten during his lecture

There was Deacon John van Grinsven speaking about his work with the homeless and addicted; Brother Ignatius Maria of the Community of St. John, who led a Bible study on the imagery of the shepherd in the Gospel of John (and also the OT books of Ezekiel and Zechariah); Fr. Floris Bunschoten who introduced us to the bishops’ task of sanctifying their flock; and Fr. David van Dijk, our host, who took us through the popes from Blessed Pius IX to our current Holy Father. Quite a variety of topics, which were supplemented by unscheduled conversations with visiting clergy and communal dinners, prayer and Mass (in both forms of the Latin rite).

Mass in the ordinary form of the Latin rite, celebrated ad orientem

Personally, I enjoyed the two days in the parish of St. Mary Magdalene, Diocese of ‘s Hertogenbosch, as a welcome immersion in Catholic life. The rhythm of prayer, the sharing of knowledge and ideas, the enjoyment of the company of fellow faithful all made for a bootcamp that really deserves more attention, attendance and publicity. Next year is the fifth edition, so let’s hope and pray that it may turn out to be the best edition yet!

Congratulations, Deacon Patrick!

The title of this post is a little bit premature, but some three hours from now, a friend of mine will be ordained to the diaconate. Sadly, I am unable to be present at the Mass in the cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in ‘s Hertogenbosch, but I do plan to be present at his ordination to the priesthood some time next year.

So for now i’ll limit myself to some heartfelt congratulations to soon-to-be-Deacon Patrick!

As a man who knows both forms of the Latin rite well, with a heart for the faith and the Catholic life, the new deacon will be a great asset to the parish of St. John the Evangelist.

Similar congratulations also go out to Deacons Maciej Sendecki and Eugène Dassen, who will be ordained to the priesthood of Haarlem-Amsterdam and Roermond, respectively, today.

Bootcamp program unfolds

With the release of the new website the Credimus Bootcamp program is fleshed out a bit more. Announcements of speakers have been published on Twitter and Facebook before, but are now gathered online on the site which also offers practical information and a rousing invitation to sign up and join the bootcamp for its fourth installment:

Do you like good conversation while enjoying a good Trappist beer, but the silence that grabs you by the throat in an old church?

Are you curious about the tradition that is the foundation beneath the culture of which you are a part every day?

Do you want to take a peek at the power which keeps everyone and everything in existence for every second of every minute?

Then you are probably CATHOLIC (or you really need to become one).

Deacon van Grinsven

Three priests and a deacon have been confirmed to speak under the banner of this year’s topic: Shepherds. Father David van Dijk, who also hosts, will speak about the eleven popes from Pius IX onwards; Deacon John van Grinsven will discuss his work with homeless people, founded in the Gospel; Fathers Marcel Dorssers and Floris Bunschoten will speak on topics that are yet to be announced. Fathers van Dijk and Dorssers wil join the bootcamp for the fourth and third time respectively.

Father Bunschoten celebrates Mass in both forms, and he has been training priests and seminarians in the Extraordinary Form at the Tiltenberg seminary. I expect he will also offer Mass in that form at bootcamp. There will also be Masses in the ordinary form, offered by Father van Dijk and other priests.

The Credimus Bootcamp will take place from 16 to 22 July, and will cost 90 euros to attend (or less if you plan to visit for less than the full week).

The church of St. Mary Magdalen as seen from the garden of the parish house.

Gearing up for Bootcamp 2011

The flyer for Bootcamp 2010, designed by Brother Hugo

When good Catholic catechesis and education beyond the basic topics is hard to find, you sometimes need to provide for it yourself. That is the basic reason why the Credimus Bootcamp was held for the first time in 2008. This year it will be organised for the fourth time and already the PR machine is gearing up. To the left you’ll notice the design of the flyer by Brother Hugo, the diocesan hermit who has been involved with Bootcamp from the start. He was also the host of the first edition.

The topic of Bootcamp 2011 is ‘shepherds’. I don’t know anything beyond that either, but I am sure that, over the course of the coming months, we will find out a bit more.

Bootcamp 2011 will be held from 16 to 22 July in Geffen, Diocese of ‘s-Hertogenbosch, where Father David van Dijk will be host for the third time running.

An impression of my experiences of Bootcamp 2010 can be found in my blog post Back from Bootcamp.

Credimus Bootcamp is a week of liturgy and lectures, but also social activities and relaxation, aimed at people roughly between 16 and 35. There will be daily Mass in both forms of the Latin rite, offered by various guest priests, the Liturgy of the Hours, Adoration, and every day guests will come and speak about all kinds of topics (past topics included the sacrifice of the Mass, Gregorian chant (also in workshop form), ecclesiology, a first-hand account of an approved miracle and people’s innate urge to find God.

Next to that, there is ample time for relaxation, meals together, a day trip on the free day in the middle of the week and random Catholic encounters with people, traditions and artifacts from the dark attic of the faith, to paraphrase Brother Hugo. For most people attending it is also a week that does not leave them unaffected: in the end, Bootcamp is all about the encounter with the living God.

Follow the Bootcamp organisation, which includes the authors of Ingrid Airam and David’s Weblog, on Twitter via CmusBootcamp and on Facebook.

Archbishop Léonard to offer EF Mass in Brussels

A Belgian Thomist reports that, on 30 January, Archbishop André-Joseph Léonard will mark the establishment of an official FSSP presence in the Belgian capital by offering a Mass in the Extraordinary Form. This is only the second time since the publication of Summorum Pontificum in 2007, that an EF Mass in the Low Countries involves such a high-level prelate. The first was, of course, the Mass presided over by Archbishop Bacqué, the nuncio to the Netherlands, on the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin (15 August of last year).

The celebration of this Mass should of course first be valued for itself and its intention: the celebration of the establishment of the FSSP in Brussels. But on a separate level it is also a firm endorsement of and support for the wish of Pope Benedict XVI that this older form of the Latin Mass be promoted on an equal level to the more familiar ordinary form, so as to firmly embed our daily Catholic experience in the long history of the Church and her Tradition.

The Mass will start at 17:30 and will be offered at the church of Sts. John and Stephen of the Minims. located at the Miniemenstraat 62 in Brussels.

Photo credit: the website of Mysterium Fidei, a Flemish movement that encourages the Extraordinary Form of the Mass.

Directions in the liturgy

This past week I had the opportunity to serve at two Masses, the first ad orientem, the second versus populum. I don’t have much experience serving at the former – I think, in fact, that this was only the second or third time I did – but the proximity in time to what I’m used to offers a great opportunity to compare them.

Both Masses were according to the Ordinary Form, so the direction the priest faces was really the only significant difference. And what the priest does to an extent dictates what the people assisting him do.

The above photo, which was taken by David Oostveen during last week’s Bootcamp, gives an idea of what the ad orientem Mass looked like. The priest, Father Martin Claes, is facing the tabernacle containing the Blessed Sacrament – Christ – and the crucifix above it. All the parts of the Mass which are directed at God – prayers, the words of consecration, the offerings of bread and wine – are spoken and presented in this direction. Priest and congregation all face in the same direction: the priest truly leads the people in prayer. The homily and other parts of the liturgy of the Mass, which are directed at the congregation are of course spoken while the priest faces the people.

In his lecture a few days after this Mass, Fr. Harry van der Vegt spoke about reference points in the Mass. The liturgy of the Mass has such a reference point, one which is reflected in the very building it takes place in: Christ, truly present in the tabernacle, and the depiction if His sacrifice on the cross, in the form of the crucifix on the altar. Like a Renaissance painting, the lines of the church guide the eye to that point.

The versus populum Mass which I served at today breaks the eye away from that reference point. The priest stands behind the people’s altar (visible in the foreground of the above photo) facing the congregation for all parts of the liturgy: both for those parts aimed at the people as for those parts directed at God. That lends a very different atmosphere to the Mass, at least for me as an acolyte. Facing the congregation is a self-conscious job: you are aware that the things you do or don’t do are being watched (whether people really watch me is something I doubt, though, but the feeling remains). The awareness of the congregation does not vanish when I don’t see them , of course. I am very much aware that it is not just the priest and me at that Mass, but my attention, merely because of the fact that I look in His direction, is on Christ and so on His sacrifice on the cross, on the Eucharist, the unbloody sacrifice.

Of course, God is not dependent on the direction we face when it comes to hearing our prayers and seeing our offerings. Essentially, the orientation (a word which, in itself, seems to refer to the act of turning eastward – east being the traditional side of the apse in Catholic Churches) towards the Lord is for our own benefit.

In his address to the gathered clergy attending the Clergy Conference in Rome last January, Msgr. Guido Marini quotes Pope Benedict XVI on this matter:

“Let us listen to the words of his Holiness, Benedict XVI, directly, who in the preface to the first book of his Complete Works, dedicated to the liturgy, writes the following: “The idea that the priest and people should stare at one another during prayer was born only in modern Christianity, and is completely alien to the ancient Church. The priest and people most certainly do not pray one to the other, but to the one Lord. Therefore, they stare in the same direction during prayer: either towards the east as a cosmic symbol of the Lord who comes, or, where this is not possible, towards the image of Christ in the apse, towards a crucifix, or simply towards the heavens, as our Lord Himself did in his priestly prayer the night before His Passion (John 17.1). In the meantime the proposal made by me at the end of the chapter treating this question in my work ‘The Spirit of the Liturgy’ is fortunately becoming more and more common: rather than proceeding with further transformations, simply to place the crucifix at the center of the altar, which both priest and the faithful can face and be lead in this way towards the Lord, whom everyone addresses in prayer together.””

As all parts of the liturgy, the direction we face and the things we gaze upon have the function of leading us towards the Lord. Giving Him due attention is not only an act of gratitude and loving worship, but also a step towards understanding, both spiritually and intellectually. God has come down towards us, has loved the world so much that He gave His only Son (John 3:16) for our salvation. This is something unheard of. God needn’t have done anything of the kind, but He did it all the same. That understanding of the sacrifice He was willing to make for us is, in my opinion, a basic cornerstone of our participation in the liturgy of the Mass.

Back to versus populum and ad orientem. This ‘leading us towards the Lord’ is possible with both of these (if done correctly, of course), but the means by which they achieve it is different. In a Mass versus populum the sacrifice of Christ is approached via the people, the community, the mystical body of Christ which is the Church. This grounds the Eucharistic sacrifice in the people, the recipients of the salvation Christ won for us. In a Mass ad orientem we first look at He who made the sacrifice. Since we believe that Christ is truly physically present in the Eucharist it seems almost impossible not to look at Him – or at least in His direction – when we address Him.

The immediate difference, at least for one who has the honour to be kneeling in front of the altar where the sacrifice on the cross is made present again, is very clear. The sacrificial character of the Mass retakes its rightful place in the liturgy, a place that in the recent past has often been overshadowed by that other important element: the communio, the sense of community of the gathered faithful.

Although ad orientem worship is often misrepresented as ‘the priest turned away from the people all the time’, the reality is more intricate. The liturgy has a structure which fits the people of God gathered before the Lord. Some parts (the readings, the homily, the invitations to prayer) we share as a community; we listen together, we pray together, we answer together. Other parts are about the community as a whole – faithful and priest – turning to the Lord, to speak to Him, to ask Him things, to offer Him our whole being. This is an inner attitude reflected and strengthened by outward gestures. And we need these gestures, as means to learn, to understand and often simply to get into the right mood.

Back from Bootcamp

I am back from a week (which seemed to go by far too quickly, as all such things do) at the Credimus Bootcamp. I enjoyed the hospitality of Father David van Dijk, and the company of good, intelligent and faithful friends. Many topics were discussed, both in interactive workshops and in lectures, and some may find their way into this blog in due time. But for now I will make do with a selection of photos I took over the course of the week.

My breviary lies ready for Lauds.

Decoration on the ceiling where the nave crosses the transept

Shadowplay in the north transept of the church

Our first guest speaker was Father Marc Heemels. He spoke about the Benedictine monastery of Le Barroux in France

Another workshop was about Gregorian music and its history. Here, diocesan hermit Brother Hugo takes a look at some examples of medieval music notation

Later, Brother Hugo taught us, or tried to teach us, the very basics of Gregorian singing

We had Masses in both forms of the Latin rite. Here Father Harry van der Vegt, cathedral administrator in Utrecht, offers Mass in the Extraordinary Form

Fr. David van Dijk was our host. Here he delivers the homily during the week's first Mass (in the Ordinary Form)

The thurible is lit, ready to incense the Blessed Sacrament

A nightly returning ritual: at the end of an hour of Adoration and Compline, Fr. David gives Benediction

A day trip on Wednesday included a viewing of many religious artifacts, including this medieval manuscript of Gregorian music

A vibrant stained glass window in the church of the Immaculate Conception in Oss, another stop on our trip

The interior of the church of St. James the Greater in the town of Zeeland

A barbecue on the penultimate night, with the weather cooperating exquisitely.

One of Fr. David's two cats says hello

Credimus Bootcamp, edition 3

For the third time I’ll be attending the so-called Credimus Bootcamp, this year from 17 to 23 July. It’s been suggested I should advertise it a bit here, and I gladly do so.

So, what is this Bootcamp thing? On the website it is described as a ‘Catholic catechesis camp for young people who want to learn more about their faith’, and that’s as good a description as I can think of. Whereas conventional catechesis in most parishes is necessarily general and superficial, the Credimus Bootcamp wants to delve into the depths of the Catholic faith, to answer the difficult questions and come up with all manner of treasures from the wealth of our faith.

In my experience it is not only a learning experience where you’re made to think and learn, both intellectually and spiritually, but also a pleasant week spent with like-minded people. Serious Catholics can have fun too, and Bootcamp offers plenty of fun.

During most days, guest speakers (priests, religious and lay people) will come and speak about subjects in their field of expertise, we will have Mass in both forms of the Latin rite, we will pray the Liturgy of the Hours together and of course sit down for meals and a drink or two in the evenings.

Of the guest speakers there have already been three confirmed for this year: Father Marc Heemels, parish priest in the parish of St. John the Baptist/Holy Curé of Ars in Eygelshoven in the Diocese of Roermond; Brother Federico of the Institute of the Incarnate Word; and Father Harry van der Vegt, cathedral administrator of the cathedral of St. Catherine and priest of the church of St. Willibrord, both in Utrecht.

Past speakers (who have included Father Tim Finigan, Father Cor Mennen, Deacon Peter Vermaat and Brother Hugo) discussed all manner of topics, ranging from the liturgy to the saints to ecclesiology. Anyone with a functioning brain should be able to follow the lectures and meetings, even if they go deeper than what you’re used to.

This years edition will take place in the parish of St. Mary Magdalen in Geffen, in the Diocese of ‘s Hertogenbosch, where Father David van Dijk will host us for the second time.

For more information you can hop over to the Bootcamp website and sign up. Bootcamp will be in Dutch, although many attendees will speak English too.