Folia Theologica et Canonica 10. 32/24 (2021)

Ius canonicum

EXEGESIS ON MOTU PROPRIO SUMMORUM PONTIFICUM BY BENEDICT XVI 127

because CCC 1124 says: “Liturgy is a constitutive element of the holy and living Tradition”. Secondly, the canonical aspect, because CCC 1125 adds: “Even the supreme authority in the church may not change the liturgy arbitrarily, but only in the obedience of faith and with religious respect for the mystery of the liturgy”. And thirdly, the ecumenical aspect, because CCC 1126 concludes: “The lex orandi is one of the essential criteria of the dialogue that seeks to restore the unity of Christians”.

These are the three aspects which Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was summarising at an interview on the liturgical reform, given in 1993, where he expressed himself thus: “My position is not one of opposition (...) What has confused the faithful has precisely been this climate of constant change, when the continuity that existed before, which did not depend on the parish priest or even on the Roman Dicasteries, was so beautiful. It was simply known that that was the liturgy of the church, which does not imply that it is necessarily a static concept”.13 And on that occasion he continued: “But we have been through so many concerns, that for the time being, I feel like a little liturgical peace, and for a ripening of ideas that will without doubt lead us in the future to a reform of the reform, but this we leave to Providence”.

In his autobiographical notes he also confesses he longed for “a renewal of liturgical conscience, a liturgical reconciliation which would recognise once more the unity of the history of the liturgy and understand the Second Vatican Council not as a severance, but as an evolutionary moment (...) Due to all of this we need a new liturgical movement which will enable us to re-live the true inheritance of the Council”.14 These words are still very valid today and could even be presented as a perfect commentary to SP in all of its terms.

Despite his criticism of this or that aspect of the post-conciliar liturgical reform, Joseph Ratzinger never discredited its principles, nor its needs, nor its legitimacy, and even less so its full orthodoxy. Not only did he accept it completely, but he also valued the reformed liturgy for its benefits. That is why he was always very careful to point out that it was in its specific application that the deviations occurred in no small number of ecclesiastical environments, as well as in the instances of an exclusive attachment to the 1962 Roman Missal, which, not being in full communion with the Universal Church, only lead to a dead-end.

As he sees it, the most grievous schisms have occurred in the application of the post-conciliar reform according to a peculiar understanding of the very nature of the liturgy, which has no fundament either in the Constitution Sacro-13 Ratzinger, J., Ser cristiano en la era neopagana. Edición e introducción de Jósé Luis Restén, Madrid 1995 185. The interview was held on the occasion of the presentation of the French edition of the book by Gamber, Tournés vers le Seigneur! Préface du Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Le Barroux 1993.

14 Ratzinger, J., Mi vida. Recuerdos (1927-1977), Madrid 2005.4 150-151.