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This is how I gave the Pope a retro make-over ("Così ho rifatto il look stile vintage al Papa")
by Andrea Tornielli

In Genoa, where he grew up, instead of "Marini" they called him Fr. "Guidino", because he is tall and thin. In Rome, where he came by the selection of Benedict XVI last October, he has come to be appreciated for his gentility but also his decision to put into practice faithfully Ratzinger's liturgical ideas. Msgr. Guido Marini, class of 1965, and for a few months now the new Master of Pontifical Liturgical Celebrations, succeeded the homonymous Piero Marini, for many years the artificer of the liturgies of John Paul II and also for the beginning of the present pontificate. If from the point of view of the name there couldn't have been a smoother transition, at the arrival of Fr. Guido - holder of several doctorates, the sometime MC and Chancellor of two Archbishops of Genoa - he hasn't gone unnoticed, thanks to the recovery of some traditional vestments. Old mitres have been exhumed, and the Pontiff has even changed his pastoral staff, abandoning the modern one in silver to take up a "ferula" (staff surrmounted by a Cross) of Pius IX. It has gotten to the point that the press during his visit to the USA spoke of a "vintage" Pope.

Il Giornale met with the MC in his office, from which one has one of most beautiful views of the Piazza of St. Peter.

In the first place, let's ask the reason for the recovery of the precious headgear of his predecessors: for example, last Christmas, Ratzinger used mitres belonging to Paul VI, John XXIII and Benedict XV.

"The vestments chosen, as also other particulars of the Rite," the Master of Ceremonies explained, "are intended to underscore the continuity of the present liturgical celebration with that which characterized in the past the life of the Church. Continuity is the interpretive key, always the exact criteria for reading the Church's journey through time. This is valid also for liturgy." "As one Pope cites in his documents the Pontiffs who preceed him, so as to indicate the continutiy of the Magisterium of the Church," Marini continues, "so in the ambient of liturgy a Pope uses also the vestments and sacred accoutrement of his precedessors to show the same continuity also in his celebratations. I would, however, mention that the Pope does not always use old vestments. He often wears new ones. The importance is not so much their antiquity or modernity, as much as their beauty and dignity, important components for every liturgical celebration."

Another huge change, more recently, is the setting aside of the modern silver pastoral Cross of Paul VI. Ratzinger has adopted a larger one, of Pius IX.

"Obviously," Marini explains, "what I just said about continuity applies here as well. In this case, however, there is also a practical element: the ferula of Pius IX is lighter and more manageable. So much so that the Pope decided to use it all the time, as was seen in also in the USA."

On some occasiones, as in the consistory for the creation of new Cardinals, the high papal throne was reinstated. Nostaligia for temporal power?

"No nostalgia", the MC responds with a smile playing on his lips. "The so-called throne, used in particular situations, is intended only to highlight the liturgical presidency of the Holy Father."

Finally, it was noted, from the moment Msgr. Marini took up his role, the presence of a Cross in the center of the altar, as in former times. Also in this case, the MC wanted to make understood the profound meaning of a choice that has nothing to do with nostalgia:

"The position of the Cross in the center of the altar shows the centrality of the Crucified One in the Eucharistic celebration and the precise orientation that the whole assembly is called to have during the Eucharistic liturgy: we don't look at ourselves, but we look toward Him who was born, died, and rose for us, the Savior. From the Lord comes salvation. He is the East, the sun which rises, toward which we must all turn our gaze, from which we all must receive the gift of grace."

Benedict XVI will celebrate a Mass using the old Rite, which he derestricted with the Motu Proprio?

"I don't know, and I am not in a position to respond. I believe nevertheless that a serene, ecclesial and non-ideological reading of these decisions by the Pontiff is important. The liturgy of the Church, just as with Her whole life, is comprised of continuity: I would speak of a development in continuity. This means that the Church procedes in her journey in history without losing sight of Her own roots and Her own living Tradition: this can require, in some cases, also the recovery of precious and important elements which were lost along the way, forgotten and which the passage of time has made less luminous in their authentic meaning. It seems to me that the Motu Proprio is aiming precisely in this direction: reaffirming with great clarity that in the liturgical life of the Church there is continuity, without rupture.