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This significant quantity is a suite of the writings of Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI) at the theology of the Liturgy of the Church, a topic of preeminence to him as a theologian, professor and non secular author. It brings jointly all his writings at the topic, brief and lengthy, giving his perspectives on liturgical concerns and questions over decades and from numerous perspectives.

He selected to have his writings at the Liturgy for the 1st quantity released of his accumulated works (though indexed as vol. eleven) simply because, as he says within the advent: "The liturgy of the Church has been for me considering that my youth the vital truth of my existence, and it grew to become the guts of my theological efforts. I selected primary theology as my box simply because i needed firstly to check completely the query: Why will we think? but in addition integrated from the start during this query was once the opposite query of the fitting reaction to God and, hence, the query of the liturgy."

By beginning with the subject of liturgy during this quantity, Ratzinger desires to spotlight God's primacy, absolutely the priority of the subject matter of God. starting with a spotlight at the liturgy, he stated, tells us that "God is first". He rates from the guideline of St. Benedict, "Nothing is to be most well liked to the liturgy", as a fashion of ordering priorities for the lifetime of the Church and of each person. He says that the basic query of the fellow who starts to appreciate himself adequately is: How needs to I stumble upon God? therefore studying the proper manner of worshipping is the reward par excellence that's given to us by means of the faith.

The crucial function of his writings at the liturgy is to put the liturgy in its greater context, which he offers in 3 concentric circles. First, the intrinsic interrelationship of outdated and New testomony; with out the relationship to the previous testomony background, the Christian liturgy is meaningless. the second one circle is the connection to the religions of the area. The 3rd circle is the cosmic personality of the liturgy, that's greater than the arriving jointly of a circle of individuals: the liturgy is well known within the expanse of the cosmos, encompassing construction and historical past on the comparable time.