Abstract
As public forms of worship of the Catholic Church, liturgies utilise visible social resources to convey supernatural gifts of grace. These rites involve actions that effect what they signify by denoting participation in the redemptive effects of the sacred mysteries surrounding the death and resurrection of Christ. Liturgical enactments operate in a narrow divide between the natural and the supernatural. The actor believes that his liturgical actions are spiritually efficacious and this belief is secured by a faith to which God responds through grace and revelation. This Divine response somehow manages to transcend the all too human efforts to use insignificant social resources to seek and to find the holy.
A Church is like a reproduction of heaven — only not as good !
(Clifton Cathedral altar server, age 9)
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes and References
I. H. Dalmais, ‘The Liturgy as Celebration of the Mystery of Salvation’ in Aimé Georges Martimort, ed., The Church at Prayer. vol. 1, Principles of the Liturgy, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell, London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1987, p. 259.
Alexander Schmemann, Introduction to Liturgical Theology, London: The Faith Press, 1966, p. 9.
Stephen Sykes, The Identity of Christianity, London: SPCK, 1984, p. 267.
Austin Flannery, ed., Vatican II. The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, Dublin: Dominican Publications, 1975.
Urban T. Holmes, ‘Liminality and Liturgy’, Worship, vol. 47, no. 7, 1973, pp. 386–387.
Luis Maldonado, ‘The Church’s Liturgy: Present and Future’ in David Tracy, Hans Kung, and Johann B. Metz, eds, Toward Vatican III. The work that needs to be done, Dublin: Gill & Macmillan, 1978, PP. 228–229.
See George A. De Napoli, Inculturation as Communication’, in Arij A. Roest Crollius, ed., Effective Inculturation and Ethnic Identity, Rome: Pontifical Gregorian University, 1987, pp. 71–98.
Anscar J. Chupungco, Cultural Adaptation of the Liturgy, New York: Paulist Press, 1982, pp. 74–76.
Charles Davis, ‘Ghetto or Desert: Liturgy in a Cultural Dilemma’, Studia Liturgica. vol. 7, no. 2–3, 1970, pp. 10–27.
Quoted in Carl A. Last, ed., Remembering the Future. Vatican II and Tomorrow’s Liturgical Agenda, New York: Paulist Press, 1983, p. 45.
Simone Weil, Waiting on God, trans. Emma Craufurd, London: Fontana, 1959, p. 140.
Dietrich von Hildebrand, Liturgy and Personality, New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1943, p. 59.
Alasdair Maclntyre, After Virtue. A Study in Moral Theory, London: Duckworth, 1981, pp. 244–245.
James Laver, The First Decadent. Being the Strange Life of J. K. Huysmans, London: Faber & Faber, 1954.
Robert Baldick, The Life of J.-K. Huysmans, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955, p. 229.
J.-K. Huysmans, The Cathedral, trans. Clara Bell, London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd., 1898, p. 80.
J.-K. Huysmans, En Route, trans. C. Kegan Paul, London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd., 1918, p. 235.
George Every, The Mass, Dublin: Gill and Macmillan, 1978, Chapters 9–10, pp. 143–172.
Louis Bouyer, Life and Liturgy, London: Sheed and Ward, 1956, Chapters 4–5, pp. 38–69.
Theodor Klauser, A Short History of the Western Liturgy. An account and some reflections, 2nd edn, trans. John Halliburton, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979, pp. 117–123.
R. W. Franklin, ‘The Nineteenth Century Liturgical Movement’, Worship, vol. 53, no. 1, January 1979, p. 39.
R. W. Franklin, ‘Guéranger: A View on the Centenary of His Death’, Worship, vol. 49, no. 6, November 1975, pp. 324–326.
R. W. Franklin, ‘Guéranger and Variety in Unity’, Worship, vol. 51, no. 5, September 1977, p. 399.
R.W. Franklin, ‘Guéranger and Pastoral Liturgy: A Nineteenth Century Context’, Worship, vol. 50, no. 2, March 1976, pp. 152–155.
Ernest Benjamin Koenker, The Liturgical Renaissance in the Roman Catholic Church, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1954, pp. 116–117 and pp. 132–134.
Garry Wills, Bare ruined choirs: doubt, prophecy, and radical religion, New York: Delta Books, 1972.
Anthony Archer, The Two Catholic Churches. A Study in Oppression, London: SCM Press Ltd., 1986.
Anton Baumstark, Comparative Liturgy, English Edition, F. L. Cross, London: A. R. Mowbray, 1958.
Odo Casel, The Mystery of Christian Worship and other writings, London: Darton, Longman & Todd, 1962, p. 103.
Margaret S. Archer, Culture and Agency: The Place of Culture in Social Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1988.
Friedrich H. Tenbruck, ‘The Cultural Foundations of Society’ in Hans Haferkamp, ed., Social Structure and Culture, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1989, pp. 15–35.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1991 Kieran Flanagan
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Flanagan, K. (1991). Liturgical Theology: Some Sociological Implications. In: Sociology and Liturgy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230375383_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230375383_3
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-39017-5
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-37538-3
eBook Packages: Palgrave Religion & Philosophy CollectionPhilosophy and Religion (R0)