Sunday, December 4, 2022

The Immolation of a Holy Oblation

As a Catholic being raised up almost exclusively in the New Rite from the age of eighteen to thirty-eight, I look back on those two decades with a few curious memories that pop up. As I have written here, I would have considered myself a "lefty Catholic" in terms of my prioritization of serving the poor and being committed to the works of social justice during that period. I experienced and took part in many egregious liturgical abuses that were simply commonplace in the circles I traveled in. Part of that I would chalk up to ignorance; you don't know what you don't know.

But there were two instances, even as a young, newly Confirmed left-learning Catholic, in which I remember being very put off by something the Novus Ordo as celebrated ad populum expressed. 

We had a priest in college who was very, let's just say, theatrical. The altar became a kind of 'center-stage' where he could be the center of attention, a performer if you will--in the gestures, the inflections, the homily, and just the overall focus. Looking back now, I remember this priest being somewhat flamboyant, but the "look at me" charades were really offputting to me at the time, when I should have been fine with it.

The second instance was similar to the first--I was living in the city after college, and this particular priest was not so much flamboyant as he was gregarious. He was a good preacher, and used the opportunity at the pulpit to try to instruct the faithful, which was admirable. But again, there was just the trigger in me that the Mass was not the place to make yourself known as a personality. I even wrote this priest an anonymous letter in which I complained about this (which I rightly or wrongly regarded as ego-centric). 

I wouldn't have been able to make sense why these 'priests on center stage' would bother me then, as I had no language to articulate it. But now, I think I do. 

Part of the problem, of course, is worship ad populum, versus ad orientum. This is the objective orientation of the priest towards the congregation in the Novus Ordo, versus with his face 'towards the East," to God (or, depending on one's perspective which would betray one's anthropological bias, "away from the people.")

I never really had any "golden unicorn" gateway drug of a "reverent Novus Ordo" to transition to Mass in the Extraordinary Form. We quit it cold turkey (at least on Sundays), and part of that was because my paradigm was starting to shift in seeing what the Mass really was: that is, front and center, it was a sacrifice. Not a "sacrifice to be there" (in terms of driving distance or longer Masses), mind you, but a sacrifice in way the Jews would understand it "the blood of oxen and goats" (Heb 10:4). In the usus antiquior, the emphasis is not on a communal meal, but a true sacrifice. 

Sacrifice is the highest form of religious worship, and true sacrfice requires three essentials: priest, victim, and immolation. "This absolute dependence of man upon his Creator is expressed in the destruction, or change, of the thing offered" [1] 

When we hear the term 'immolate' we think of those Buddhist monks setting themselves on fire in political protest in Vietnam or Tibet. They 'sacrifice' their bodies (by the unholy act of suicide) which are rendered to ashes, completely consumed by the flames of that act. There is nothing left. 

This act of immolation--the killing and utter destruction of the victim in the act of sacrifice--is largely obscured in the New Rite. I think this is what, at my core, chaffed against what worship should be, even when I experienced it as a liberal teenager and in the New Mass. The priest as victim should be immolated, be consumed into sacrifice and disappear if you will. But instead these priests took the opportunity to put themselves in front of the altar prancing around and gesticulating with their personalities center-stage. You couldn't not see them.

Contrast this to the priest's presence in the Extraordinary Form. He essentially disappears. A minimal amount of his personality comes through, held back by the rubrics of the Mass for the benefit of the faithful. He "prays the black and does the red," and any other priest who is trained to do so can step in seamlessly take his place were he not available. The lamb, the sacrificial victim, is killed and burned up--immolated. This is a worthy sacrifice and is fitting to worship. Because the four elements of this worship--priest, victim, altar, and sacrifice--are essentially inseparable, the priest mystically does so as well. 

For the faithful, we have the benefit of "seeing Christ" in this sacrifice, not seeing Fr. Bob or each other. We do not travel to hear an "awesome homily" as Protestants do or "see people and catch up", but to offer fitting sacrifice of ourselves in the sacrifice of Christ the Paschal Lamb in atonement for our sins. This can be a paradigm shift in how we think about the nature and purpose of sacrifice for those who may only know the New Mass. At least if was for me. When you do reorient yourself, though, you start to "see" with different eyes what is really taking place before you at the altar. Christ is the ultimate sacrifice pleasing to the Father. Sacrifice is the essential form of religion, and the immolation of the oblation reminds us that "God is a consuming fire" (Heb 12:29)


[1] The Latin Mass Explained (Moorman), 5, 15

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