The Offensive Canon

Luther's liturgical surgery upon the mass was largely limited to the canon of the mass (specifically, what we call today the Eucharistic Prayer).  He pointedly objected to the language of sacrifice which had transformed the mass from the gift of God given to the people of God into the gift of God's people and their re-presentation of Christ's [unbloody] sacrifice to the Father on our behalf.  While we might spend hours here talking about this, the words were largely unknown to the laity of Luther's day.  Spoken in Latin, the language of the elite or academic, and spoken in a whispered voice, silent before the congregation, his excision of these offensive words was something that would have gone unnoticed to the vast majority of people in the pews.

Even today, unless you are attending Mass in the Extraordinary Form (the Latin mass), you hear just about everything the priest says.  For many centuries, however, the Roman Canon was said nearly silently -- audible only to those assisting the priest at the altar and unheard by the people.  One commentator said:  When you hear Eucharist Prayers at Mass, remember this: the priest is not talking to you.  He is addressing God the Father on your behalf in the way that only an ordained priest can.

Luther did not remove as many of the sacrificial elements from the Mass as it is sometimes stated.  There are many who make great importance of Luther's liturgical reforms of the mass but most of this was lost to the congregation.  They were tuned into to what was going on and when by the ceremonial of the mass, by the ringing of the bells, and by the cue of the priest (he speaks the phrase "Nobis quoque peccatoribus" in a slightly audible voice, and says or sings aloud the final phrase of the doxology, "per omnia saecula saeculorum", so as to let the server or the choir know when to say or sing "Amen").  By these markers, they knew where they were -- literally -- in the mass and tailored their response in the appropriate way.  Because it was offered silently, Luther could omit most of the Canon of the Mass without upsetting the people. The most dramatic of Luther's liturgical changes was that the Words of Institution were to be sung aloud to the same tone as the Gospel was chanted.

While I am not here to argue with Luther's critique of the mass, or what it had become, I marvel at those who make much of his liturgical legacy when, to the naked eye of the people of Wittenberg, little was heard or seen that sounded or looked different from the Roman mass -- save that one point.  Luther had the Words of Institution chanted on the Gospel tone -- a move sure to identity the Verba Christi as Gospel and not Law.

Luther was not insensitive to this and in fact insists that as little be done as possible to disrupt what people expected within the mass (in words and actions).  So while we today make much of his liturgical legacy, the people at Wittenberg and the surrounding area did not recognize that much of a change when it comes to the canon of the mass (or Eucharistic Prayer).  The ceremonial that they had come to expect was largely there.  The elevation was there.  They still watched with their backs to the Pastor and what would surely have stood out was not what was missing but what was present -- the Verba Christi sung aloud.  It is quite amusing in this regard to listen to the complaints of Lutherans against that “catholic” chanting of the Words of Institution. Rome has never done so! It is a Lutheran innovation!


Interesting also is the complaint of traditionalist Archbishop Lefebvre who insisted that Vatican II had followed Luther's errors in the shape of the new mass.  Indeed, Luther's response to the Mass was shaped by his reading of Scotus and Biel.  Luther, not primarily a patristics man or liturgical theologian, found the teaching therein offensive.  What is then ironic is that some today complain that Luther was ever the medievalist when he excised the canon and left the bare minimum, the Words of Institution.  As St. Thomas Aquinas says:

The Consecration is accomplished by the words and expressions of the Lord Jesus. Because, by all the other words spoken, praise is rendered to God, prayer is put up for the people, for kings, and others; but when the time comes for perfecting the Sacrament, the priest uses no longer his own words, but the words of Christ. Therefore, it is CHRIST’S words that perfect the Sacrament.... The form of this Sacrament is pronounced as if Christ were speaking in person, so that it is given to be understood that the minister does nothing in perfecting this Sacrament, except to pronounce the words of Christ. (Summa, III, Q. 78, Art. 1).

Now a sacrifice cannot occur without the immolation, or “offering up,” of a victim. St. Thomas Aquinas says, “It is proper to this Sacrament that Christ should be immolated in its celebration.” (Summa, III, 83, 1). In the Sacrifice of the Cross and the Sacrifice of the Mass, the primary sacrificing Priest, namely Christ, and the sacrificial gift are identical. Only the nature and mode of the offering of the two are different. Each and every valid Mass recapitulates – makes present once again – the same Sacrifice which occurred at Calvary. The only difference is that Christ’s Sacrifice on the Cross was bloody, that of the Mass is unbloody. The sacrifice of the Cross and that of the Mass are nevertheless one and the same Sacrifice. As the Catechism of the Council of Trent states:

The bloody and unbloody Victim are not two, but one Victim only, whose Sacrifice is daily renewed in the Eucharist... The priest is also one and the same, Christ the Lord; for the ministers who offer Sacrifice, consecrate the holy mysteries, not in their own person, but in that of Christ, was the words of Consecration themselves make clear; for the priest does not say, “This is the body of Christ,” but, “This is My Body,” and thus acting in the person of Chris the Lord, he changes the substance of bread and wine into the substance of His Body and Blood.

While Luther would not argue that the body and blood of Christ present and received (without much explanation as to how and therefore the rejection of transubstantiation) was, indeed, the very sacrificial body and blood of Christ once offered on the cross and now made present, the offense was that the direction of this offering was primarily toward God and not to the people of God.

So, to bring this all to a close... for those who make much of Luther's insistence upon this point, it must be difficult to know that at the very same time Luther worked to make much of the transition to the evangelical (a classic word) position as seamless and smooth as possible, that his changes were largely unseen and unheard by the people in the pews, and that, for all intents and purposes, the chanted Verba are the one lasting and enduring innovation -- now the spoken form out loud regularized by Rome as well.  What might Luther have done if he had been a patristics scholar (more like Laurentius Petri in Sweden), we can never know; he might have distinguished the language of the canon from the use of a canon.  Nevertheless, Lutherans equally as committed to the sacramental character of the Eucharistic presence have worked for generations to restore the prayer of thanksgiving that accompanies the Words of Thanksgiving (the Verba) of Christ.

I am just sayin.... well, I do not need to tell you.  I bet you already know where I stand on this....