O Lord, "deliver Thy people from the terrors of Thy wrath"

Those of you who have followed this Blog, since its inception, may well remember a piece I wrote a week ago, entitle 'God, why are you punishing us?' Interestingly - at least, I thought so - it has proved to be the significantly most clicked on article that I have written. I'm not sure what this says about people's current frame of mind, but I hope what I wrote might have proved helpful to readers.

In the Blog-piece, I outlined the view that the current epidemic is not something sent by God to punish us, but rather, its genesis may be traced back to human sin. God, whilst not directly willing our current suffering, for very good reason is not simply going to intervene and make it all go away. He is, however, very much engaged with us at this time, and desires to be very close to us. More or less, the entire thrust of this Blog has been to try and help people find Him in the current time.

However, my piece from last week did raise an interesting question from someone, who commented on Facebook. He is a Catholic who attends the traditional Latin Liturgy, and he pointed my attention to the Latin Votive Mass and prayers for "for the deliverance from death in time of pestilence". I know many traditional priests are offering this Mass now, during the current pandemic. The texts for this Mass include a number of phrases that are interesting for us to consider.

• In the Introit it says "[b]e mindful, O Lord of Thy covenant and say to the destroying Angel: Now hold thy hand."
• In the Collect is prayed "O God... in thy clemency withdraw the scourge of Thy wrath."
• In the Secret Prayer the connection is made to release from sin and then deliverance from "all ruin and destruction."
• The Postcommunion then prays once more that God would "deliver Thy people from the terrors of Thy wrath".

These texts do raise interesting questions. The Liturgy is one of the sources through by which the faith of the Church is transmitted, and so it cannot simply be dismissed as out-of-date. The ancient maxim, lex orandi, lex credendi (roughly - as we pray, so we believe), holds true. The prayer of the Church reflects the Faith of the Church. Therefore, we do need to consider carefully what light this shine on the connection between God's will and the Covid-19 crisis.

The Contention

To begin our consideration of this, let us get the proposition clear in our mind, which we will then attempt to address.

(1) The Liturgy is an expression of our Faith. (2) The Liturgy is saying pestilence is a result of God's wrath against sin. (3) Therefore, our Faith tells us that this pestilence is a result of God's wrath against sin.

How might this be answered?

• Whilst it is true that the Liturgy is an expression of our Faith, we must be careful not to ascribe to it the precision of a dogmatic definition. The Liturgy expresses the Faith of the Church poetically, rather than in the form of logical syllogisms. Therefore, we cannot take Liturgical texts, and use them to overturn clear teaching, that evil is not a quid pro quo punishment for sin.
• "As he passed by, he saw a man blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be made manifest in him." (John 9.1-3)
• There were some present at that very time who told him of the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And he answered them, “Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered thus? I tell you, No; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish. Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Silo′am fell and killed them, do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others who dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, No; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish.” (Luke 13. 1-5)
• "God is in no way, directly or indirectly, the cause of moral evil." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 311)
• "God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 413)
• Furthermore, it must be understood that both the Liturgy and the Church's teaching cannot be frozen in time. There is authentic development.
• When we come to know another person it takes time to get to know the other better.
• This is partly because we tend only to see one side of the person. A man who is very stern and serious in his work, might be much more relaxed, jovial and warm when he is at home. His employees would, therefore, have a very different sense of who he is and what he is like, than would his family. In practice, of course, most people aren't as clearly divided as all that. The different sides of our characters come out when we are placed in different circumstances - stress, success, poverty etc. Only by knowing others over time, do we get a fuller sense of who they are.
• It is also because we are very apt to project onto others, things which we ourselves are carrying. If we have been hurt by someone in the past, for example, when we meet someone who bears a passing similarity to the one who hurt us, we can easily project that onto the new person. Or, someone who is feeling guilty is very likely to assume that someone else is judging them, even on very scant evidence. Since we all do this, to a certain extent (albeit often in smaller, very unconscious ways), our relationships with others will always be a little bit coloured by this. Therefore, our relationships with other grow, as we grow over time.
• If this is true of  personal relationships, it is also true of the Church. As the centuries go by, the Church grows in her relationship with God  and begins to see new aspects in Him. Likewise, as the Church grows and matures in her understanding of herself, the things that She projects onto God, change.
• This can lead to an authentic development in doctrine. "Theologians generally indicate that the development of doctrine must be looked at basically in four ways: The first is what is called the objective development of doctrine. This means that doctrine does not expand or contract in the absolute and ultimate sense, but what it does mean is that there is a way in which what is contained in the fonts of revelation, which is to say, Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition, is expressed in a way which is catechetical, affective, and unscientific or even pre-scientific, is re-expressed in formulas which are clear and more scientifically specific. Furthermore, these formulas are often stated in such a way that they constitute answers to entirely new questions. " (Address to the Church Teaches Forum, Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz, July 11 1998) 
• This texts from the Liturgy with which we began date from the reign of Pope Clement VI, at a time when Europe was being ravaged by plague. In a world which was very conscious of sin and God's righteous judgement and with very little understanding of the scientific causes of the pestilence, it is not really surprising that a Liturgical text with prayers such as these emerge. 
• However, having moved on to a world where we are, alas, a lot less conscious of our sins, but, very much advanced in our good scientific knowledge of the world, it would be slightly peculiar if we thought and prayed about the current epidemic in the same the way as the Black Death. The Church, over the last 1000 years, has grown and reflected, and now would not be hasty to imply that Covid-19 is sent by God.

Authentic Development of Doctrine

I want to be very clear, that I am not saying, by this, that the Church can simply change her mind about all sorts of teaching. Concrete things which have been revealed as true, cannot be simply reversed. Even if we get to know another person over time, and come to see different sides of that person, it doesn't mean that the definite things we learned about them or from them at the beginning can cease to be true - what their name is, where they come from, who their family are etc. In a similar way, just as today we might be more inclined to preach about God's tender, merciful love for sinners than at some other points in history, doesn't mean it ceases to be true that God is Trinity, that Jesus died for human sins or that adultery is always and everywhere wrong.

Authentic development of doctrine is always that - development, not change or reversal. There are some clear, accepted principles on what can be an authentic development, which are simply outlined here.

It is important to note, that while in the Liturgical texts we have considered there is an implication that the pestilence is a punishment more sin, it is not an explicit teaching. Nowhere has the Church taught officially - as far as I am aware - that the Black Death, the Bubonic Plague or the Coronavirus are punishments sent by God.

Family Treasures

If that is true, then wouldn't it be better simply to throw out these texts? Well, as a priest who celebrates the Latin Mass, and would quite happily pray these prayers, I'd say no. They have a value.

In Protestant communities, there can be a tendency for people to break away when they find something they do not like in their church. If they don't feel quite at home, the culture is often to go and find another. Each protestant denomination can then have the feel of a nice new home, where everything is swept and put in order, just as the new founder or new member likes it. The things have just been moved in, and he knows what everything is and where it should go.

The Catholic sensibility is different. In the Catholic Church the tendency is to emphasise the unity of the family, both around the world, and indeed backwards and forwards in time. We should think here of a big, old family house, that has been in the same family's hands for centuries. It is a bit untidy, and there is tons of stuff in the attic - some of which we're not really sure where it belongs. But, we never throw anything out, that belonged to the family. Why? Well, because it meant something to somebody once - and that makes it mean something to us.

So I will pray these prayers, uniting myself with the priests down through the centuries, who have prayed these self-same words. But, I'll pray them, asking my God to deliver me from His righteous anger, knowing that in His merciful love, that is just what He is yearning to do.