This article was written by Michael LaRue, a friend of The Anglo-Catholic. I imagine that it might stir-up some controversy here on the blog.
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Heaven and Earth in Little Space: A Critique
I have been asked to provide my rationale and facts for saying the
following:
"What I have read of Msgr. Burnham's works in particular leads me to believe
that he is not really been converted in his thinking to a properly Catholic
approach, especially with regards to the liturgy, and that he has been
encouraged in his thinking, coming from a middle of the road if ritualistic
modern Anglican liturgical perspective, by those in the Catholic Church who
do not hold or accept the Holy Father's teaching on the faith and the
liturgy."
I am not impugning Msgr. Burnham's character, nor his motives, nor the
genuineness of his entry into the Catholic Church. Nor do I have any reason
to doubt that his approach to celebrating the mass is anything other than
one should expect from a good Catholic priest. I have no real reason to
doubt any of these things. I am concerned about his theological thinking,
especially as regards the liturgy, given his prominent rôle in this process.
There are a number of points I could make from things he has said, but as a
counterpoint his little book "Heaven & Earth in Little Space" has been
commended to me in refutation of my concern, and since it is precisely that
book that is the greatest source of concern, I think it sufficient to point
out something about this little book.
He obviously has great knowledge of the sacred liturgy. He has read widely,
including many Catholic sources, and he has served on the liturgical
commission of the Church of England. he also has a good sense, both for
aesthetics and for pastoral need. True he does like proposing his own
solutions for things in such a way that one wonders how he justifies them
from tradition, but he also is clearly interested in preserving and making a
place for tradition.
However, the book has a serious, I would say a fatal deficiency, from a
Catholic perspective. Having been raised in Anglicanism, in a very
"high-church" if not strictly speaking Anglo-Catholic parish, I was made
aware early on that the great temptation of Anglo-Catholics was to take on
ritual and good aesthetics without taking on a solid Catholic theology. The
result was a tasteful and ritualistic form of Liberal Protestantism, which
justifies itself by certain devotional practices and a strong emphasis on
the Real Presence. However, the dictum of H. Reinhold Niebuhr often applied:
"A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment
through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross." In Anglo-Catholic
circles in particular, this brand of Liberal Protestantism was notable for
talking a great deal about the incarnation, which fit with a ritualistic
worship, but lightly glossing over the cross and the sacrifice of Christ.
On the other hand one of the great things about becoming a Roman Catholic,
attending daily for a few years the Traditional Latin mass, faithful and
reverently celebrated, and meditating on the rite and the Roman Canon in
particular was to see how central the Cross was to Roman Catholic worship
and to Catholic theology, and how essential was our participation in that
sacrifice, like that of the martyrs listed in the Canon: The mass is the
unbloody representation of Calvary on our altars, whereby the priest shows
forth the sacrifice of Christ to us, and we enter into that sacrifice,
offering all of our selves as Christ did for the life of the world. The
cross is essential to understanding our worship. Nor is this perspective
absent from Anglican theology (if sadly it has been generally sidelined,
especially by its main stream). As Michael Ramsey pointed out, the world's
notion of glory is turned on its head by Christ, whose glory is a shameful
death. Without an emphasis on the Cross of Christ, the liturgy easily and
quickly becomes one or other form of aestheticism, whether baroque or
sentimental or restrained and cool it matters not, for it has lost its
power. And the people who approach worship in this fashion have lost their
Gospel.
Now, looking at Msgr. Burnham's book, which has, as I have said, many good
points, it is nonetheless clear that he has fallen into precisely the same
old trap of many Anglo-Catholics. He begins and ends with a fine piece of
late mediaeval poetry, precisely incarnational, which is well and good if
one uses the Incarnation to point to the cross. I was very encouraged indeed
when his first chapter began with Hebrews 10:11-12, 14. However, for the
rest of the book, the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross remains little more
than a footnote. I would note how different this is from the approach of the
Holy Father, for whom the sacrifice of Christ is essential in understanding
the liturgy. True Msgr. Burnham does point us back to Calvary in his
critique of Cranmer's communion office; he points out in passing the
necessity of the crucifix on the altar, and of meditating on Christ's
sufferings. But this is always as parenthetical remarks in passing, and then
he proceeds on practically without the sacrifice and falls back on another
line of argument.
The difference in terms of worship between pagans (especially
neo-Platonists) and Christians in the ancient world had to do with how both
interpreted the word "theurgy", literally "divine work". For pagans theurgy
was a work of man in trying to open himself to the divine. For Christians,
however, theurgy was God's work in the world to bring man back to him. This
has profound consequences for the liturgy. Without the cross and sacrifice
of Christ at the center of our liturgical theology, our worship easily falls
back back into paganism, even idolatry. The liturgy becomes something we do,
something we make up even, to open our selves up to the "divine" or, in
modern theological parlance, the "transcendent". The givenness of the
liturgy, anchored in Calvary, something on which the Holy Father insists, is
lost, and thus also is lost the key role of tradition, both particular as
representing the work of God in a particular community, as well as universal
tradition. The consequence of this is that the liturgy becomes a matter of
something we make up, in which innovation and combination and creating new
forms become a ceaseless activity. As I look at Msgr. Burnham's suggestions,
it seems to me that that is exactly the kind of trap into which we are in
danger of falling.
If this were merely the matter of the developing thought of a new Catholic,
one who appears headed in the right direction, I would not worry. But we are
at a key point in the development of the Anglican Ordinariates, and to go
off course would have severe, if not fatal consequences for our mission,
which is the salvation of souls. This requires the best we have to offer,
and indeed our whole selves, which by the mighty power of God working in us,
will lead us to join ourselves in Christ's sacrifice for the salvation of
our fellow men. It requires that first things be first, that we preach and
indeed live "Christ crucified" and that we hew closely to Holy Tradition. If
we do not wish to have to answer for our failure to follow and witness to
Him before the dread judgment seat of God, then it is essential that we get
this right. It is this concern which impelled me to speak.
Michael LaRue, K.M.
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