The Catholic Layman: His Place in the Church Services

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 50, 20 December 1923, Page 35

The Catholic Layman: His Place in the Church Services

An interesting paper entitled, “The Catholic Layman in Church Services,” was read at the morning session of the Catholic Truth Conference held lately in the Round Room, Mansion House, by the Rev. J. B. O’Connell, C.C., Dublin. In introducing the lecturer, the Most Rev. Dr, Morrisroe, who presided, said Father O’Connell had interested himself in matters liturgical for a long time, and his treatment of them deserved to be read and listened to. Father O’Connell said the part of the layman in Church services was, according to the mind of the Church, on© of active participation. His place in the Sacred Liturgy was indicated with unanswerable authority by Pope Pius X. So essential was some part in Sacred Liturgy that the Church required a minimum participation in it under pain of mortal sin (i.e. the hearing of the greater part of Mass on Sundays). Why was an active participation in the Sacred Liturgy necessary? Pius X. characterised an active participation in the Sacred Mysteries and in the public and solemn prayer of the Church as the first and indispensable source of the true Christian spirit. Only liturgical piety secured the full hallowing influence of the visible priesthood of the mystical body of Jesus Christ on the members of that body. That the layman’s part in church services was, according to the mind of the Church, not a passive but an essentially active one might be exhaustively illustrated from the prayers and ceremonies of the Mass. This active participation of the layman in the Sacred Liturgy consisted in—(a) Greater interest in and “knowledge of the liturgical functions at which he was present and in which he was supposed to take part. Hence some study of the history and symbolism of the Liturgy and especially the use of a Missal, that the great central act of Catholic worship might be more vitally and deeeply participated in. (I)) A knowledge of the Liturgical Cycle and the ordering of one’s acts of worship in according with its principles. (c) Participation in the music of the Church (congregational singing). (d) An interest and participation in parochial organisationthe parish being the unit of liturgical worship. (e) An increased loyalty to the liturgical spirit of the Church in private devotions and public observances (e.g. funerals) —in the strict fulfilment of her rubrics in those matters that affected lay people (e.g. the making of liturgical vessels, vestments, ornaments, etc. ; the building and decoration of churches, etc.). The Rev. J. S. Sheehy, C.M., All Hallows College, said he had been connected for a number of years with the teaching of liturgy to ecclesiastical students, and even with them he had difficulties such as Monsignor Dunn© referred to. Father O’Connell’s paper would be the first great trumpet call to them to go back to the true liturgical idea of worship. They must begin in the schools if they wanted to have a revival of divine worship in its true liturgical sense. W .

When the mother pearl has received the drops of the fresh morning dew it draws within itself and closes its shell to preserve them fresh; in like manner, when you have received the Blessed Sacrament withdraw into yourself and collect all the faculties of your soul to adore this sovereign King, and relish by a lively faith the spiritual refreshment which this Divine Germ produces in your breast.