Biskop Elliot snakket 11. mars ogs\u00e5 om pave Benedikts syn p\u00e5 liturgien som en levende ting som m\u00e5 utvikles organisk, og om hvordan fokus i liturgien alltid m\u00e5 v\u00e6re rettet mot Gud:<\/p>\n
Cardinal Ratzinger\u2019s critique of liturgical discontinuity rested on the conviction that authentic liturgical development is always organic. This understanding was favoured by the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council in Sacrosanctum Concilium. But changes that followed the Council were not always organic. As he bluntly put it, organic growth was replaced, \u201c\u2026as in a manufacturing process, with a fabrication, an on the spot banal product.\u201d<\/p>\n
Change in liturgy should not be concocted by committees or individuals or produced by experiments. That undermines the foundation of liturgical continuity – that liturgy is a gift, from God, through the Church. Yet he is frank about past problems, comparing the liturgy to an endangered fresco preserved by whitewash, which was stripped away, only to be \u201cendangered by climatic conditions as well as by various restorations and reconstructions\u201d.<\/p>\n
While Catholic liturgy develops, it is a treasure handed on to us, entrusted to us by the Church. Therefore he applies to liturgy what he applies to the interpretation of the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, a \u201chermeneutic of continuity\u201d, understanding the Council in the context of all preceding Councils and papal teachings. By sharp contrast, the \u201chermeneutic of discontinuity\u201d breaks with the past and interprets liturgy as our creation, what \u201cwe do\u201d, or as we hear in some quarters, what we do when \u201cwe gather\u201d, adorned with such inventions as \u201cgathering hymns\u201d and a \u201cgathering rite\u201d. \u2026 <\/p>\n
\u2026. We note how our Holy Father reminds us that in worship we are meant to focus on God, to give God the glory, not to glorify ourselves. He criticized a self-centered overemphasis on ourselves that has damaged the quality of worship. When the liturgical community turns in on itself, it ends up worshiping itself. Self-centric worship is supposed to \u201cbuild up community\u201d, but in practice it undermines community. \u201cOnly when the sacrament retains its unconditional character and its absolute priority over all communal purposes and all spiritually edifying intentions does it build community and edify humans.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n