Church: A Place Where Mystery Happens - #20

One of my Protestant colleagues in the North American Academy of Liturgy pointed out a very important point to me last year. He said Protestants and Catholics approach the Word of God differently. Protestants understand the Bible, the Word of God to be a text. After all, he said, the printed press came into existence at the time of the Reformation and Luther used it well to get a copy of the Bible text into every Christian's hands. Because the Bible is a text, he said, you will find preachers telling people to open their Bibles to a text that is being preached. Or you will find that television preachers will have the text at the bottom of the screen as they are preaching about it. But, my friend said, you Catholics are different. You consider the Word of God to be something that is proclaimed or announced in public by readers, deacons, and your presiders. Catholics do not look up texts or follow along. You listen, he said.

In short, what my friend said was that the Scriptures are a literary and textual reality for some Protestants, especially Baptists and evangelical free-church congregations. (Many Lutherans, Anglicans, Episcopal, and Presbyterians are using a lectionary like ours and are cultivating the Word as a spoken proclamation). The Scriptures are an oral and aural reality for Catholics. One emphasizes seeing the text. The other emphasizes hearing the text.

I think that my friend has got it right - except for one phenomenon that Catholics still tend to cling to. This phenomenon is connected with missalettes, which, historically, is connected with Latin Mass and the use of missals. Let me explain. When I was a boy, Catholics attended Latin Mass and did devotional prayers, especially the Rosary and textual prayers, while the priest said (or read) the Mass. Then, around the 1940s and 1950s Catholics began to learn some of the Latin chants and were encouraged to participate better. Many bought missals and read the Scriptures and the Mass prayers in English as the priest did the liturgy in Latin at the altar. Catholics followed the priest by using missals. When the Mass was put into modern languages, Catholic publishers (being good entrepreneurs) published missalettes with the Scripture texts and a modest selection of hymns and other liturgical music. Proclamation, the art of presenting the Word to the people, was still new. Readers, lay and ordained, were still learning their craft. The ambo, or reading stand, replaced the pulpit. Congregations became aware of sound systems and acoustics.

We've come a long way. We've discovered that worship involves all our senses and our bodies in movement (processions) and stillness (contemplative listening). The Liturgy of the Word is an oral-aural art. We are expected to look at the reader and to listen to the Word proclaimed. High quality sound systems, continued training in the art of proclamation, and the presence of those who do signing can help persons with hearing disabilities. For the rest, it is time to put down missalette texts and to listen. What to do with leftover missaletts? Ever think of a good Halloween bonfire!