No Joke: Liturgy Has Made "Much Progress" in Recent Decades - Francis

Francis defended "liturgical rites" during his February 3 General Audience by criticising movements which have been pushing them aside.

He criticised their argument that "external ceremonies" are only a useless and harmful burden which impairs the "purity" of an a-liturgical religiousness, and explained that “Christianity without a liturgy is a Christianity without Christ.”

According to Francis, the Church has made "much progress” in recent decades regarding the centrality of the liturgy in the life of the faith [while, in reality, these decades have been a time of unmitigated liturgical decadence.]

He explained the truism that Mass cannot simply be "listened to" as if we were merely spectators of something that slips away "without our involvement.”

For him the [verbose] Eucharist is always celebrated, not only by the priest who “presides” over it, but by all Christians who “experience” it. Nevertheless, the Vatican strictly avoids the term "celebrating" for the Novus Ordo Eucharist and insists that it is only "presided," while the Traditional Latin Mass is of course "celebrated."

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