Inverted in Many Ways

The other day I was paging up a breviary and I came across the holy card from this post, and Fr. Venantius's reflection on a priest seeing his reflection in the chalice during the consecration. (I have three sets of breviaries going right now: Latin, English, and Italian.)

I was just thinking about how, most of the time, the reflection one sees in the chalice is inverted. It's like when you see yourself in a spoon; the concave surface refracts such that your reflection is upside-down.
Thinking on this, I'm reminded that the person I think I know as myself is not the same person known by the Creator. My distraction and sin distorts my self-knowledge. Coming to know myself as God sees me is the substance of the spiritual journey. So it turns out that you really should take the advice of your kindergarten teacher when she said to 'be yourself.' Trouble is, it's not something you can just do, but a long and sometimes terrifying work of the spirit.

Perhaps it's a trite reflection, and if it is I apologize, but maybe when I see my inverted reflection in the chalice I can be reminded that Jesus Christ died and rose into the Eucharist and the other sacraments precisely that I might be 'reverted'. That I, one who finds himself as a homo incurvatus in se, a human being bent over and turned back in on himself, might learn to stand up and be the flourishing creature willed by God. This new person, as he emerges in the course of my journey of prayer, might appear upside-down and foreign because of my confusion and my attachment to false selves, but this is an optical illusion of the spiritual vision. The image that appears to be upside-down only looks funny because my confusions and disordered affections have distorted my perspective; in the end it is he who will turn out to be the real me.

When Options are Norms, and Vice Versa

The Church's liturgy has norms and options. It's amazing to me that they are often treated in reverse; to ignore or transgress norms is often overlooked or even praised, but to question the use of certain options is unimaginable. It's backwards.

For example, I have been in places where the use of illicit matter for Mass is praised as 'greater attention to symbol.' The use of extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion while clerics are readily available is praised as 'inclusive.' Elements which are normative on certain days, like the Gloria or the Creed, are omitted according to personal taste. (This is how the so-called liberal approach to liturgy self-destructs; it becomes a tyranny of individual taste and opinion. Everyone one is a liturgist, and we must all conform to the opinion of the "presider.")

On the other hand, while it's o.k. and even praised to ignore norms, it's not o.k. to question certain options. In some cases, one may not even raise a question about how certain options seem to have hardened into unassailable norms; e.g. the offering of Mass versus populum or in translation, or of replacing the actual texts of the Mass with songs and metrical hymns. These options for the celebration of Mass have become such de facto norms that a lot of people, including priests, don't remember that they are options and might not even believe you when you tell them. Maybe you just want to explore the tradition in a spirit of innocent curiosity, but soon you will earn for yourself various unpleasant labels.

Backwards!

In the past men were handsome and great (now they are children and dwarfs), but this is merely one of the many facts that demonstrate the disaster of an aging world. The young no longer want to study anything, learning is in decline, the whole world stands on its head, blind men lead others equally blind, and cause them to plunge into the abyss, birds leave the nest before they can fly, the jackass plays the lyre, oxen dance. Mary no longer loves the contemplative life and Martha no longer loves the active life, Leah is sterile, Rachel has a carnal eye, Cato visits brothels, Lucretius becomes a woman. Everything is on the wrong path. In those days, thank God, I learned from my master a desire to learn and a sense of the straight way, which remains even when the path is torturous. (Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose)

Penitenziagite!

In these days in which I am studying the Mexican bishops' marriage ritual in preparation for a wedding in Spanish in two weeks, working through the 1962 Missale Romano-Seraphicum, and saying some of my Office from my Liturgia delle Ore Romano-Serafico each day for Italian practice, I'm starting to feel like Salvatore from The Name of the Rose:

Penitenziagite! watch out for the draco who cometh in futurum to gnaw your anima! death is super nos! pray the santo pater come to liberar nos a malo and all our sin! ha ha, you like this negromanzia de domini nostri jesu christi! et anco jois m'es dols e plazer m'es dolors...cave el diabolo! semper lying in wait for me in some angulum to snap at my heels. but salvatore is not stupidus! bonum monsasterium, and aqui refectorium and pray to dominum nostrum. and the resto is not worth merda. amen. no?

Or as he says in Ron Perlman's immensely entertaining portrayal:

Penitenziagite! Watch out for the draco who cometh in futurum to gnaw on your anima! La mort e supremos! You contemplata me apocalypsum, eh? La bas! Nous avons il diabolo! Ugly cum Salvatore, eh? My little brother! Penitenziagite!

SVILUPPO: Two years after this silly post, I find myself trying to read the book in Italian. So, arriving at this same section, how could I resist posting it?

Penitenziagite! Vide quando draco venturus est a rodegarla l'anima tua! La mortz est super nos! Prega che vene lo papa santo a liberar nos a malo de todas le peccata! Ah ah, ve piase ista negromanzia de Domini Nostri Iesu Christi! Et anco jois m'es dols a plazer m'es dolors...Cave el diabolo! Semper m'aguaita in qualche canto per adentarme le carcagna. Ma Salvatore non est insipiens! Bonum monasterium, et aqui se magna et se priega dominum nostrum. Et el resto valet un figo seco. Et Amen. No?

Mac vs. PC

Lee Hamilton left this link in a comment for a recent post, but since it has been amusing me all day, I just wanted to plug it in its own post. Click here to check out Umberto Eco's account of why the Macintosh is Catholic and DOS is Protestant, with Windows being an "Anglican-style schism." It's much funnier than those silly commercials, in which, incidentally, the dorky guy who plays the PC is also a Mac user in real life.