What does it matter?

One of the congenital defects of the liturgical movement is our attempt to make things easier for people not accustomed to or even alien to rite, ritual, ceremony, chant, postures of worship, vestments, etc...  We tend to treat these as strong tastes that must be learned in small portions.  That is why so often we never get there.  We take such small steps forward that we really do not move at all.  It does not help that our pastors are counseled at seminary either not to make needed changes in bad liturgical practice or to make them very slowly and to explain them until people would rather have the practice than the explanation any longer.  It surely begs for a long pastorate.

Underneath it all I fear is not that we do not like nose bleed high church.  No, underneath it all I fear is the fact that we are really not convinced that it is worth it.  We do not value as we ought the grand mystery that takes place in the liturgy as the means of grace unfold before us the very presence of the mighty God manifesting the fruits of Christ's redeeming work in earthly means.  The whole idea that this must happen in 59 and 1/2 minutes is testament to the fact that we resent giving God any time and we do not really believe He is worthy more nor are the gifts given and received in the liturgy.  The pandering to the sound of music outside the Church more than within the sacred choral, chant, and hymnic tradition is due to the fact that we don't believe the music matters nor what it says (or sings).  All music has become elevator muzak as background track for something which is nice but not so nice it should inconvenience you.  Vestments and chanting are resented because we resent the whole idea that what happens in God's House is different from what happens in our own living rooms -- we resent sacred vestments and vessels as well as chant because the idea of the sacred offends us.  Truth be told we are more at home in the secular.  God forbid you introduce incense because we value our false images of health and our sense of taste more than we do any Biblical image or passage -- God help us if heaven does not have a non-smoking section!

In the end, if we believe it is simply in what happens on the altar to the bread and wine then should not what surrounds the altar be of the highest quality and attention that we can provide?  If the Scriptures are God's Word and the sermon has a sacramental purpose of addressing us with that living voice of God applied to our daily lives, why must it be brief or funny or entertaining?  If the Eucharist truly is what we confess it to be, should we not spend time praying and preparing to receive it?  If God allows us to be guest and feeds us with the foretaste of heaven's eternal food, should we not dress up instead of dressing down?  If this music flows out of God's entrance into our world, why would we expect our music to be imposed upon His?  If the pastor (priest) is acting in persona Christi to address us with God's Word and wash us clean at God's font and feed us from his very hands the flesh and blood of Christ, why would we not honor him with our attention and kneel in adoration before the heavenly door that opens in each Divine Service?

How do you explain this to people?  I wish I knew.  How do you explain loving air conditioning and a kitchen and hot water over living in a cave?  Is it not obvious and self-apparent?   Unless we are not really convinced and so because we do not value more than anything God's presence and gift within the Divine Service we are not sure what to say in defense of it except we like it?  I like a grilled cheese sandwich but I also like prime rib and I know the difference.  Do our explanations fall short because we cannot really explain the difference between worship music that sounds like Cold Play and chant or because we are not sure why all the time needs to be spent in church as opposed to on our screens?  If God is not worth our being inconvenienced, He is not worth much at all.  It is tiresome that we find ourselves on the defense when it comes to rite, ritual, and reverence.  We ought to admit it.  Either you believe God is worth it or you don't, what God gives in the Divine Service is worth it or it isn't, and matters of eternal salvation are even more important than our feelings in the moment or they are not.  The decay of Christendom will not be hastened by too much attention to ceremony but it will surely die for banal homilies on boring subjects in white washed buildings devoid of anything that points us beyond ourselves.