INCULTURATION

The Mass is not designed to honor men and their culture, but to pay homage to God, to worship and thank and petition Him.

When pagan nations convert to Christianity, Christ supposedly reclaims and purifies all the 'good things' from their cultures. But what do these 'good things' have to do with the Catholic Mass? Hmmm. I wonder why is it that the white horse never made it into the Mass in my ancestral homeland. Horses are good things... aren't they? Why is bear OK and horse is not? I fail to see the difference. Unless of course all this inculturation is nothing more than the Church bowing down to the politics of reverse discrimination. Because bending over backwards to accommodate native cultures is racist. True equality means that we are treated the same regardless of color, race or culture. That means no accommodation of pagan beliefs and practices.

There is a big difference between burning sweet grass in the context of a Catholic ritual. But when the Penitential Rite is replaced with a sweet grass ceremony or when pagan blessings are incorporated into the Mass or when pagan ancestors are invoked in prayer – we are uniting the sacred with the profane and in some cases with the satanic. Those who cannot be Catholic without letting go of their cultural bondage have not yet converted. So convert them, but don’t expect to paganize everybody else in the process.

Vatican is Bored by 'Reverend Showman' and His Antics. (19 March 2008, allAfrica.com) Speaking at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA), Africa's most senior cleric at the Vatican, Nigerian-born Cardinal Francis Arinze, protested at masses where the celebrant came across as "Reverend Showman."

"The cardinal also said other abuses resulted from a misunderstanding of inculturation, and from the notion that the Second Vatican Council opened the way to unbridled creativity.

"The liturgical reforms of Vatican II are to be seen with the hermeneutics of continuity, and not with those of discontinuity; that is, the Catholic Church is the same before and after Vatican II. It isn't another Church."



TFC Photo by Theresa Huntenburg

Members of St. Joseph Parish Liturgical Drum and Dance Group perform before the Black History Month Mass Feb. 5 at St. Mary Church in Fort Walton Beach.


Dancing at the 2007 Los Angeles Religious Education Congress African American Mass


Taking the dragon to mass


The Four Corners Ceremony in San Juan Capistrano Mission is based on Indian Rites and Shaman Paganism

Two laypeople, Jerry Nieblaus and Kathy Sandoval performed the sacred Four Directions ceremony during the Mass. Carrying an abalone shell filled with burning white sage, Nieblas pointed to the four directions as Sandoval, wearing a willow bark skirt, fanned the smoke with red-tail hawk feathers and prayed. "We honor the creator, our homeland and ancestors and ask them to pray for us and to be with us on this day," said Nieblas.


Jesuit priest wearing an Indian chief's headdress for the mass at the (Kateri) Tekakwitha Conference.


Francis Cardinal Arinze is blessed by an Indian Feather


This would be ‘holy smoking’ John Paul II


and 'blessing' His Holiness by an eagle feather (sic)


Preparing for the "Indian Mass"

June 24, 2005 Los Angeles, the mass included pagan symbols, pagan songs, pagan blessing and pagan dances. Celebrant Auxiliary Bishop Gabino Zavala called it a "historic" Native American Mass.

After he blessed the "sacred space," Bishop Zavala said: "Grandfather Creator, fulfill your promise. Send your Holy Spirit to make us witnesses before the world. So the good news proclaimed by elder brother Christ, who lives through you and the Holy Spirit, one God forever and ever." The Offertory song was "Planting Stick," the Communion song, the "California Bear Healing," and the meditation and exit hymns were ancient pagan songs in the Tongva Indian tongue.

TEKAKWITHA CONFERENCE

One of the goals of the Tekakwitha Conference is “to empower Native American Catholics “to live in harmony with their Catholic and Native Spirituality”. (emphasis mine) -- in other words the goal is to unite Catholic and pagan spirituality.



Yaqui dancers and Southwest Pueblo Eagle dancers around the altar (1996)


Plains Indian dancing around the altar (1999)


Butterfly Dance after Communion at the Native American liturgy March 2. (Religious Education Congress, Los Angeles)


Native American Mass at the 2007 Los Angeles Religious Education Congress

Translation and Inculturation in the Catholic Church by Stephen M. Beall, Ph.D.