Sandro Magister registers in his wonderful weblog the possible implications of the papal speech to the Cappella Musicale Pontificia Sistina (the foremost pontifical choir) and links to an old article of his, written right after the publication of then-Cardinal Ratzinger's book on sacred music and his memoirs.
This great article describes the appalling dismissal, in 1997, of the old director of the Cappella, Domenico Bartolucci, named by Pius XII in 1956 (for life, as had always happened to the directors of the Cappella, including the most famous of them all, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, pictured above with Pope Julius III). Bartolucci was replaced by Abp. Piero Marini's nominee and Pope John Paul's own favorite, the current director, Giuseppe Liberto.
Liberto had been a director of ecclesiastical music in Sicily and was famous for his "sacred music for the masses"; nothing more appropriate, it seems, than someone like him for Pope John Paul II, even it it meant the destruction of the superior standards of quality of the Cappella Sistina. If one wishes to understand the mind of a Marini, one needs to know that it is not as important to create new things (for instance, by creating a new, parallel, "pop-style" choir) as it is to destroy the Traditional institutions by change (for instance, by transforming the spirit of the Cappella Sistina itself).
Bartolucci had been quite frank; as Magister quotes him:
This great article describes the appalling dismissal, in 1997, of the old director of the Cappella, Domenico Bartolucci, named by Pius XII in 1956 (for life, as had always happened to the directors of the Cappella, including the most famous of them all, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, pictured above with Pope Julius III). Bartolucci was replaced by Abp. Piero Marini's nominee and Pope John Paul's own favorite, the current director, Giuseppe Liberto.
Liberto had been a director of ecclesiastical music in Sicily and was famous for his "sacred music for the masses"; nothing more appropriate, it seems, than someone like him for Pope John Paul II, even it it meant the destruction of the superior standards of quality of the Cappella Sistina. If one wishes to understand the mind of a Marini, one needs to know that it is not as important to create new things (for instance, by creating a new, parallel, "pop-style" choir) as it is to destroy the Traditional institutions by change (for instance, by transforming the spirit of the Cappella Sistina itself).
Bartolucci had been quite frank; as Magister quotes him:
The origin of the ailments of today's Church is in the rupture which was effected, after the Council, with the previous liturgical tradition.*
RUPTURE... Where have we seen this word used recently? Oh, yes, here. Magister also mentions that Ratzinger directly interfered, to no avail, to prevent Bartolucci's dismissal (a very dishonorable dismissal, since it happened by phone while the Cappella was on tour in Japan) -- one of the extremely rare circumstances in which Ratzinger pleaded for someone outside of his congregation.
Any cold analysis of the post-Conciliar tragedy shows that the "hermeneutics of rupture" was active mainly in the "liturgy of rapture": the complete vernacularization and the destruction of Sacred Music in the 1964-1969 period of wild "experimentations", crowned by the absolute rupture which was the Novus Ordo Missae of 1969. A new liturgical order whose "soul", in the words of Marini himself, is the "spirit of adaptation". New Mass, thy name is change...
This whole introduction (I intend to speak more in the near future about Bartolucci, Liberto, Marini, and the Pope) is necessary for the most amusing part of the article, when Magister presents the following dialogue with Liberto:
Any cold analysis of the post-Conciliar tragedy shows that the "hermeneutics of rupture" was active mainly in the "liturgy of rapture": the complete vernacularization and the destruction of Sacred Music in the 1964-1969 period of wild "experimentations", crowned by the absolute rupture which was the Novus Ordo Missae of 1969. A new liturgical order whose "soul", in the words of Marini himself, is the "spirit of adaptation". New Mass, thy name is change...
This whole introduction (I intend to speak more in the near future about Bartolucci, Liberto, Marini, and the Pope) is necessary for the most amusing part of the article, when Magister presents the following dialogue with Liberto:
Liberto: "I have not read Ratzinger's latest book**"
Journalist: "Not even those pages which have caused great impact?"
Liberto: "No, not even those."Journalist: "Not even his thoughts on Sacred Music and the liturgy collected in 'Cantate al Signore un canto nuovo'*** , edited by Jaca Book?"Liberto: "No, I have not had the time."
Oh, the disdain... Well, this does not sound like someone who had any idea that Ratzinger would one day become his boss... Will the Cappella Sistina be freed ("liberata") from Liberto?
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*It is an analysis with which I completely agree: the crisis of the Church is, above all, a crisis of the Roman Rite.
**"Milestones: 1927-1977", released in Italian in 1997, in which Ratzinger had mentioned, among other serious criticisms, the "tragical consequences" of the liturgical revolution
***"Sing a new Song".
**"Milestones: 1927-1977", released in Italian in 1997, in which Ratzinger had mentioned, among other serious criticisms, the "tragical consequences" of the liturgical revolution
***"Sing a new Song".
