Thanks to The Lion and the Cardinal for a recollection from Simon Tolkien of his grandfather, JRR Tolkien going to Mass in Bournemouth. Apparently the English Mass had just been introduced but Tolkien didn't like it. While the rest of the congregation made the responses in English, he made them loudly in Latin, oblivious to the reactions of others.(See: J.R.R. Tolkien goes to Mass)
9 comments:
My " The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien " just arrived! Can't wait to read!
I've been doing that for years, and I'm only forty-six! I'm thrilled to know that I'm in his curmudgenly company!!
Catholic Mom, I wonder if there'll be some references to the changes in there, similar to the letter of Waugh released under the title of "A Bitter Trial". Be on the lookout, and post if you find them!
It wasn't just the language of the Mass which Tolkien found objectionable. As the New Rite ''gradually'' came in, he also began to notice a diminution in the number of genuflections, reverences to the Altar etc, not to mention a great many other abuses. I am sure that Tolkien found the banal modern English of the Mass personally insulting, given the nature of his former occupation. In fact, one Mass Tolkien attended was so bad, so divorced from what he grew up with and loved profoundly, that he got up from his pew, walked awkwardly to the aisle, made three profound bows to the Tabernacle, and stomped out in wrath.
I think that one can glean somewhat of Tolkien's kind of Catholicism by carefully reading his work. Now, while there are no rituals or religious customs in Middle-earth (unless one counts the ''Standing Silence'' before meals as such), the very air that one breathes, the very water that one drinks, the very stones that one feels are all Catholic. Tolkien's genius was to reveal the Faith through a veil - very much like God reveals Himself to us through mystery, in the Sacred Liturgy.
This is a blog comment and not a blog post, so I shan't go into too much detail, but one thing that I have noticed about The Lord of the Rings (after much reflection, as it is not that obvious) is a sense of the Communion of Saints. Even under the shadow of the fear of Sauron, life seems not just tolerable, but worth the living, because of the reverent memory and regal history of the good men who came before, just as holy and heroic as the Saints. With this goes the profound reverence for the Traditions passed on by Men, which comes from the Eldar, and ultimately from God. The history of the West has thus been exalted.
In view of this, how could Tolkien NOT find the loss of the Traditional Roman Rite, the greatest treasure in the trove of the Church, a source of grief? I am sure that Tolkien was pierced through the heart when, going to Mass every Sunday, he realised that the Old Mass had in fact vanished from his life. Tolkien decried the folly of ''liturgical experts'' impetuously digging up the Tree (the Liturgy) to find the Seed, as this was little more than a vain, and ethically Protestant, search for ''purity'' and ''primitiveness,'' which was never a guarantee of value. No matter how much the New Rite encompassed ancient elements (which Tolkien said amounted to little more than a reflection of ignorance), no matter how more ''intelligible'' or ''pastoral,'' the New Rite, to Tolkien, was heart-breakingly that; New.
I must say this was a hilarious little story which made me very, very happy today!
From a letter Tolkien wrote to his son in 1967:
‘Trends’ in the Church are…serious, especially to those accustomed to find in it a solace and a ‘pax’ in times of temporal trouble, and not just another arena of strife and change. But imagine the experience of those born (as I) between the Golden and Diamond Jubilee of Victoria. Both senses of imaginations of security have been stripped away from us. Now we find ourselves nakedly confronting the will of God, as concerns ourselves and our position in Time. ‘Back to normal’ – political and Christian predicaments – as a Catholic professor once said to me when I bemoaned the collapse of all my world that began just after I achieved 21. I know quite well that, to you as to me, the Church which once felt like a refuge, now often feels like a trap. There is nowhere else to go! (I wonder if this desperate feeling, the last state of loyalty hanging on, was not, even more often than is actually recorded in the Gospels, felt by Our Lord’s followers in His earthly life-time?) I think there is nothing to do but pray, for the Church, the Vicar of Christ, and for ourselves; and meanwhile to exercise the virtue of loyalty, which indeed only becomes a virtue when one is under pressure to desert it.
There are, of course, various elements in the present situation, which are confused, though in fact distinct…The ‘protestant’ search backwards for ‘simplicity’ and directedness-which, of course, though it contains some good or at least intelligible motives, is mistaken and indeed vain. Because ‘primitive Christianity’ is now and in spite of all ‘research’ will ever remain largely unknown; because ‘primitiveness’ is no guarantee of value, and is and was in great part a reflection of ignorance. Grave abuses were as much an element in Christian ‘liturgical’ behavior from the beginning as now. (St. Paul’s strictures on eucharistic behavior are sufficient to show this!) Still more because ‘my church’ was not intended by Our Lord to be static or remain in perpetual childhood; but to be a living organism (likened to a plant), which develops and changes in externals by the interaction of its bequeathed divine life and history – the particular circumstances of the world into which it is set. There is no resemblance between the ‘mustard seed’ and the full-grown tree. For those living in the days of its branching growth the Tree is the thing, for the history of a living thing is part of its life, and the history of a divine thing is sacred. The wise may know that it began with a seed, but it is vain to try and dig it up., for it no longer exists, and the virtue and powers that it had now reside in the Tree. Very good: but in husbandry the authorities, the keepers of the Tree, must look after it, according to such wisdom as they possess, prune it, remove cankers, get rid of parasites, and so forth (with trepidation, knowing how little their knowledge of growth is!). But they will certainly do harm, if they are obsessed with the desire of going back to the seed or even to the first youth of the plant when it was (as they imagine) pretty and unaffected by evils.
The other motive (now so confused with the primitivist one, even in the mind of any one of the reformers)” aggiornamento: bringing up to date: that has its own grave dangers, as has been apparent throughout history. With this ‘ecumenicalness’ has also become confused. I find myself in sympathy with those elements that are strictly ‘ecumenical,’ that is concerned with other groups or churches that call themselves (and often truly are) ‘Christian.’ We have prayed endlessly for Christian reunion, but it is difficult to see, if one reflects, how that could possibly begin to come about except as it has, with all its inevitable minor absurdities. An increase in ‘charity’ is an enormous gain.
Hebdomadary, you will look in vain for anything as detailed and meticulous as Evelyn Waugh's observations. Tolkien's Letters were compiled by an Anglican, with a few suggestions from his son Christopher, and the letters themselves are aimed primarily at documenting the evolution of his work, and giving further insights into them. As such, there is comparatively little about the liturgical changes of the '60s (none at all about previous liturgical change). Many letters were of course left out (the vast majority I would imagine) for their personal content or being more to do with the tedium of business and publication. I would still like to see them though. Many are doubtless held in the Bodleian, some by private collectors, most by the Tolkien family, and the rest are either lost or kept by the families of Tolkien's correspondents.
Childermass, you didn't need to type that up (or paste it from somewhere) as I am sure that people with the book could look it up for themselves.
This reminds me of the (doubtless apocryphal) story of a Catholic Aristocrat in the early years of the 20th century who made a very loud, and very political, addition to the end of the Leonine Prayers.
The dialogue went as follows:
"... and do thou, Prince of the Heavenly Host, thrust down to hell, Satan and all wicked spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls"
"And Lloyd George"
I found this line interesting, "I found the whole experience quite excruciating, but my grandfather was oblivious. He simply had to do what he believed to be right."
I can't help but reflect on whether or not we'd all find this so amusing if it were the other way around and a person attending the Extraordinary Form of the Mass made loud responses in English because they were doing what they "believed to be right"? I doubt it.
(Lest anyone think I am an enemy of the traditional Mass I say one publicly every day at my church in addition to Mass in the Ordinary Form in English.)
Father,
speaking of 'modern liturgies' my world is turning upside down! If charimatics and lifeteen are the only ones to stand with the Pope and Bishop Athansius (contra mundum) Schneider, then hand me my guitar!
k.c.
K.C.'s new hero, LifeTeen President Randy Raus, says Pope's kneeling Communion emphasizes the True Presence of Christ!
http://kneelingcatholic.blogspot.com/
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