CALLED TO PARTICIPATE: Theological, Ritual and Social Perspectives

By MARK SEARLE
About the author:
He was born September 19, 1941, in Bristol, England. As a young adult, he joined the Franciscan
community in England, and then he went to Europe to complete his studies.
Mark came to the United States in 1978 and taught at the University of Notre Dame. He left the
priesthood and married Barbara Schmich in 1980.
Center for Pastoral Liturgy and then on the
Theology faculty at Notre Dame - coordinator of the graduate program in liturgical studies and,
from 1983 to 1988, director of the master's degree program in theology. He also influenced
numerous students in summer programs and lectures throughout the United States and in
other countries from England to New Zealand.
Assembly magazine, - editor a consultant for the International Commission on English in the
Liturgy, and the editor of several books.
He had a deep affinity with the National Association of Pastoral Musicians because of his
personal commitment to the development of pastoral liturgy as a field of academic study, an
equal partner, as he would say, with the historical study of the liturgical rites. His development
and reporting of the Notre Dame Study of Parishes, especially the component on liturgy and
music were instrumental in providing a more scientific approach to pastoral liturgical studies.
Mark Searle died August 16, 1992.
About the Book: Called to Participate
Called to Participate is the late Mark Searle’s last testament on liturgical reform. It draws on the
teachings, writings, and international lectures of this noted liturgist and professor. Where do
we go from here? Searle asks in response to the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council.
The reader will find nothing here that can be implemented per se but an invitation to all people
in the Church to participate in liturgy according to its very nature and in so doing, realize an
essential aspect of their Christian vocation.
Chapter 1 – historical perspective, presenting two liturgical movements, that offered
complementary approaches to the task of renewing the liturgy. Each has his own way of
conceptualizing participation in the liturgy.
Early movement: People to the liturgy
Influence: The French Revolution and the Marxist Ideologies
Recent one: Liturgy to the people
Influence: Nazi Regime; Catholics were deprived of everything except the eucharist and certain
devotions; The Church discovered the value of the liturgy.
Pius XII – Secret commission preparing a general reform of the liturgy (easter vigil, holy week
liturgy)
Popular missals, the dialogue Mass
By searching out the roots of the early liturgical movement, he lays out an alternative emphasis
that can enrich our own post-Vatican II efforts at continued renewal and more engagement in
liturgical prayer.
Chapter 2 – Invites people to the liturgy
Describe the nature of the complex event:
- Liturgy as ritual activity
- Liturgy as the work of Christ
- Liturgy as sharing in the life of God
Deeper levels of participation, each with its own disciple and its own language, moving from the
visible to the invisible, from the human to the divine. Taken together, they constitute the
inward or contemplative dimension of the liturgy.
Chapter 3 – Selected aspects of the liturgy (proclamation of the word, the prayers of the liturgy,
its gestures, and finally the very time that surrounds it.
Contemplative perspective – how a participant might move from the ritual level into the action
of Christ and on to the sharing of the divine life of the Trinity.
Submit to ritual constraints, to take on the work of Christ and ultimately to experience heaven
on earth.
Chapter 4 – Complementary dimension of the liturgy, its outward or public aspect.
Explores the social character of the liturgy, which points beyond any particular gathered
assembly and draws its participants into a unity that transcends space and time.
To respond to this invitation is to participate in God’s work in human history with all the social
and political consequences that entails.
Called to Participate bids us to form a contemporary spirituality that is firmly rooted in the
liturgy. It leads worshipers to find entry points into the mystery of God’s work in the world. It is
a help to liturgical leaders to grasp the nature and function of liturgy and to inspire faith-filled
planning, preaching, and catechesis.