LITURGY AT THE COUNCIL

As the preparatory work for the Council got under way, there was great interest in this agenda item: of more than 2800 proposals received by the Council's Preparatory Commission, a quarter were related to the liturgy, so there was plenty of work for the 24 bishops and 36 consultants allocated to work on the topic. Rome was full of liturgical experts eager and available to help (and naturally hoping to influence) the thirteen sub-commissions working on its different aspects of the subject. Despite the scale of the task, the prominence of liturgical reform as a theme for discussion in the preceding decade or so meant that the schema (draft) on the liturgy was produced quickly. It was ready in January 1962, a full nine months before the Council opened. Amusingly, when the Council’s liturgy commission eventually met on 11 October 1962, its members discovered that it does not always pay to get your draft in too early, especially if it is likely to be controversial. Without their knowledge, the text had been altered with the agreement of the President of the Commission, a cardinal of the Curia, putting into effect a different set of proposals from a secretly assembled, more conservative ‘shadow’ committee. The alterations were subtle, not dramatic, diluting rather than removing items, particularly those favouring the vernacular over Latin.This bizarre episode was a sign that the conservative minority was both willing to attempt to obstruct the agreement on liturgical reform which everyone could see was coming, and completely at a loss as to how it could effectively do so. In fact, whether in the sessions of the Liturgy Commission or on the floor of the Council itself, it must have been very difficult indeed to argue effectively against the majority view as reflected in the draft put before them. It reflected a consensus worked out over more than a decade in academic conferences and publications, and in the 82 meetings of the (secret) papal Commission set up by Pius XII in 1948 to prepare for reforms to the liturgy, and which had continued meeting right up to the establishment of Preparatory Commissions for the Council in June 1960.

 Annibale Bugnini, the Secretary of the papal Commission throughout its life, immediately took up the equivalent position on the Council’s Liturgy Commission. He drafted the document accepted as the proposal of its 'progressive' majority, all the other drafts submitted being rejected unconsidered as too conservative. He had just seen the draft agreed in a vote taken on 13 January 1962 when he was summarily dismissed by Pope John, probably following denunciation for exceeding his powers in some way. His radicalism, power and success all aroused resentment

 If the aim of those behind his removal had been to stop or delay the progress of the draft, then it failed. In the absence of its author, it went forward to the plenary session of the Council, and 50 hours of debate (involving 387 oral interventions and 297 written submissions).^[1] The most contentious item was considered first and debated over several days: the place of the vernacular in the mass. Most speakers were in favor of at least part of the mass being in the local language. It aroused passionate opposition from a minority which saw Latin as the guarantor and sign of the unity and even of the identity of the church. However, representatives of Eastern-rite Catholics were quick to point out that their ancient tradition included a vernacular liturgy. This encouraged Western-rite bishops from Japan, India, Madagascar and Taiwan to argue for the vernacular in recognition of their cultural differences compared to societies rooted in the Mediterranean world.^[2] The document was agreed by 2158 votes to 19 on 22 November 1963, in time to be formally proclaimed at the closing meeting of the second session of the Council on 4 December.