Nathaniel MARX, Authentic Liturgy. Minds in Tune with Voices. Liturgical Press Academic, 2020, pp.266. $34.95 pb. ISBN 9780814684696. Reviewed by Andrew CIFERNI, Daylesford Abbey, Paoli, PA 19301.

Nathaniel Marx is associate professor of sacramental and liturgical theology at St. Meinrad Seminary and School of Theology. He holds an MA in social sciences from the University of Chicago and a PhD in liturgical studies from the University of Notre Dame. This work is grounded in his previous research and doctoral dissertation.

Marx’s Benedictine context is evident in the fist sentence of the Introduction to this work where he cites the Rule of Benedict.

“Chapter 19 of the Rule of Benedict instructs the monks in the right way to pray when they together for the Liturgy of the Hours: ‘Let us stand to sing the psalms in such a way that our minds are in harmony with our voices (emphasis mine).’” This is the cord giving order and coherence to this expansive work of erudite scholarship. Marx invites the reader “to embrace the moral and religious value of authenticity (his emphasis). The author is a master at bringing into a unitary vision many of the dichotomies that beset the theory and practice of liturgy and the sacraments in our day, dichotomies that can be traced back to more than a millennium of ascetical – especially monastic - and theological writing. “As it pertains to liturgy, authenticity is rightly construed when it aims at the glorification of God and the sanctification of human beings…. Authenticity is built up by bringing “minds” and “voices – interior activity and exterior activity into harmony, concord or “tune,” as most English translations have it (SC ii).”

Marx’s argument is laid out in resourcing: the Bible (chap.2); early church (chap.3); Middle Ages to nineteenth century (chap.4); modern liturgical reformers, especially Guardini and Congar, Ressourcement, and Vatican II (chap. 5); “tuning adjustments” (post conciliar and contemporary theological reflection and debate) (chap.6); authentic liturgy and the virtue of authenticity (chap. 7). Fourteen pages of bibliography, a name index and a thorough topic index follow.

An example. Marx demonstrates how the twelfth century change from “mens nostra concordet voci nostrae” (Let our mind be in harmony with our voice) to “ut concordet vox tua cum mente tua” (let our voice be in harmony with our mind) is one of several precedents leading to the sixteenth century Reformers critique of the Roman liturgy and their sense of freedom in radically revising it. That insight is an example of the consistent clarity and insight Marx brings to his argument for authenticity grounded in instances where the church has not infrequently misunderstood its own best sense of its tradition.

It is especially in the last chapter of Authentic Liturgy that Marx presents “An examination of conscience for liturgists” which brings to a close the very pastorally focused goal of the deep academic foundation he has established in these few pages of examen for those serving the People of God by their ongoing study and celebration of Word and Sacrament to the glory of God and the formation of a People committed to that call. This is an especially important study for liturgy professors and graduate students, and all those still convinced of the secondary importance of the liturgy as a core theological discipline pertinent to the practice of individual and corporate prayer and spiritual formation.