Intentional liturgy depth answer to rote action says expert

Fr Paul Turner from the Diocese of Kansas City-St Joseph in Missouri spoke with host James Bergin in the latest episode of the Catholic Kiwi Podcast during his recent New Zealand tour.

Asked about the idea of “full, active and conscious participation” in the liturgy, Fr Turner said “one of the key words I try to impress on people is ‘intentionality’”.

“It’s especially a temptation in a ritual-based church like ours to just say the words, just do the actions, go through the motions and say we’ve done it. But to enter inside them with intentionality is something really very beautiful.

“One of my professors in college seminary used to say, ‘what you do daily you do dully, unless you do it deeply’. And his point was you can get deeper and deeper inside a ritual if you let it come forward.

“So I think full, conscious, active participation is something that we can do interiorly and exteriorly, something we make more and more our own through a conscious reflection on the words and actions of worship, but also by participating, singing, responding to the dialogues and taking part in the fullness of Catholic worship.”

Fr Turner, a consultant to the Vatican and several international groups, said that “when a community is singing well or responding well, you can just kind of read the attentiveness, the intentionality of the people and the other ministers. And it really is a beautiful thing”.

He stressed the importance of attentiveness when people are addressing God in the liturgy.

Fr Turner, who has been a priest for 47 years, expressed his encouragement for parents of children at Mass.  “ . . .  [I]f parents are taking care of children, it’s a different kind of participation. They are helping us, the rest of us participate and they’re training their children for the future.”

Among the topics discussed in the podcast were the many biblical allusions in prayers at Mass, the deep meaning of the private prayers said by priests in the liturgy, Gregorian chant, polarisation in culture and in the Church, and the work of the International Commission on English in the Liturgy, with a lot of work being done recently on the Liturgy of the Hours.

He addressed complaints about the liturgy, as well as the flexibility the Church offers, even in daily Masses.

“There’s more flexibility [and] choices than people may realise. We do need to take advantage of those to add the proper variety to the Mass and let people experience the many options that are there.”

Fr Turner also spoke about being a server at Masses before and during the Second Vatican Council, and about how his love for the liturgy developed at a very early age, as did his sense of a vocation.

“My own story was one of excitement and faithfulness within the Church,” he said.

Fr Turner also reflected on his ministry as a parish priest and working at a cathedral, as well as serving in prison ministry and among multicultural communities and in supporting the homeless.

FULL STORY

Catholic Kiwi Podcast: Season 2, Episode 11 – Fr Paul Turner (Catholic Kiwi Podcast/YouTube)