Editor’s Note: This is the first of a five-part series by Dr. Smith in response to A Synoptic Look at the Failures and Successes of Post-Vatican II Liturgical Reforms by John Cavadini, Mary Healy, Thomas Weinandy and published in Church Life Journal. Future articles in this series will be published on successive Mondays.
A Rorate Caeli Mass embraces the attendees in an atmosphere of mystery, transcendence, and solemnity; it is very clear that something supernaturally wonderful is happening. I went to a Rorate Caeli Mass on a punishingly windy, cold, rainy morning—most fitting for an event marking emergence from darkness to light, from evil to goodness. The Mass began at 7 AM in a mostly dark church lit by hundreds of candles on the altar and in the church; everyone in the congregation was holding lit tapers.
The symbolism was impossible to miss. Advent is the time when we realize how dark the world is without Christ and how desperate we are for the light that He brings. The Mass is devoted to Mary who enabled that light to come into the world and enables all of us to be Christ-bearers. …
