Anselm J. Gribbin,Pope Benedict XVI and the Liturgy: Understanding Recent Liturgical Developments

Anselm J. Gribbin, Pope Benedict XVI and the Liturgy: Understanding Recent Liturgical Developments , Gracewing: Herefordshire, 2011; 240 pp.: 9780852447550, £12.99 (pbk)

Perhaps one of the most abiding and interesting legacies of Pope Benedict XVI's pontificate will be the attempt to bring more sharply into unity the different expressions of worship through the sacred liturgy. In 2007, the publication of the Pope's ‘motu proprio’ Summorum Pontificorum, allowed the pre-Vatican II form of the rite of the Mass (what is popularly called ‘the Extraordinary Form’) become more readily available for priests and people to celebrate. Part of this shift clearly stems from the Pope's own experiences as a peritus (expert) during the Second Vatican Council as a young priest. Josef Ratzinger is first and foremost a scholar and this includes being a scholar of liturgy.

Anselm Gribbin has done us a great service by providing a one-volume summation of Ratzinger's liturgical theology in Pope Benedict XVI and the Liturgy. Divided into four chapters and followed by some crucial and insightful reproductions of interviews with the Pope's Master of Ceremonies, Monsignor Marini, Gribbin begins vitally by reviewing and drawing our attention to Ratzinger's seminal work The Spirit of the Liturgy (2000). This first chapter does draw a little too often on lengthy quotations from the original work and not enough on an analytical approach to that work, but this initial frustration soon fades away when the second chapter begins. This examines an important critique of The Spirit of the Liturgy by the liturgist Pierre-Marie Gy op, to whom Ratzinger was able to respond after the critique appeared. The critique is well summarized by Gribbin and highlights Gy's central thesis well: that Ratzinger does not, it seems, make adequate reference in The Spirit of the Liturgy to the Constitution on the Liturgy Sacrosanctum Concilium. The only point, Gy continues, where reference is made to Sacrosanctum Concilium is to examine the ‘dangerous concept’ (p. 50) of active participation in the liturgy and this shows to Gy ‘no concern for how active participation deepens the piety of the faithful’ (p. 50).

Gribbin spends two chapters attempting to devise a rationale for what he terms as a Pax Liturgica, by examining how the liturgical thinking of the Pope has influenced his wider pastoral ministry, such as in his homilies and speeches in General Audiences as well as in the motu proprio. Focusing on the Pope's role as a teacher is important and, in doing so, Gribbin does show how important prayer and worship of God are to the Pope and how in the Pope’s own view, the celebration of the liturgy expresses ‘the obedience to faith’ (p. 127). From this crucial perspective, we can see a little more clearly why Pope Benedict XVI was so clear on the importance of promulgating the Summorum Pontificorum for the sake of the wider Church.

This book is an important summary of the liturgical theology of the former Pope and while, at times, very technical and dense it is nonetheless important for any liturgist, ecclesiologist or Church historian to have in their collection.