There are two groups of people whom I want to address in this final chapter: those who are keen about liturgy, and those who are enthusiasts for sociology. And, to sum up what I want to say before I have even said it, my thesis is that liturgy leads to sociology, and sociology must be based on liturgy. Neither can afford to neglect the other, for both of them are direct consequences of the doctrine of the Mystical Body of Christ.

First, to the liturgists. If the liturgy is going to have no effect outside the four walls of the church, it is a mere sham. If people are going to sacrifice together, pray and sing together as brethren in Christ and fellow members of the Mystical Body - and after all that go out and swindle each other, exploit each other, or even be indifferent to each other's plight - then they have been a pack of hypocrites in church. They have not been meaning the things they did and said and sang. They have been only "going through the motions" - which is not liturgy at all.

Pope Pius XI said that all must "banish from the lives of Christians that inconsistency which causes some Catholics, to all appearances scrupulous m fulfilling their religious obligations, to assume a second conscience when it is a matter of labour, industry, professional life, trade, or public duties, and in this sphere to behave in a manner which is unhappily far from conformable with the obvious principles of justice and Christian charity" (Divini Redemptoris, C.T.S., n. 76).

These people have "fulfilled their religious obligations". They are themselves baptised and confirmed. They have been to Mass, to Confession and Communion; they have been married in Church and brought their children for Baptism. They have - externally at least - taken part in liturgy. But they have not been formed in their outlook and conduct by the liturgy. They have acquired none of the "social piety" discussed in the previous chapter, but have remained individualist. And so they are individualists outside the church too - looking only for their own personal advantage. They do not conform their conduct to "the obvious principles of justice and Christian charity".

Now we mustn't be like that. If we are filled with the genuine spirit of the liturgy - which is a social spirit - then we cannot fail to be concerned about the social evils of our times. When we hear that "a small number of very rich men have been able to lay upon the teeming masses of the labouring poor a yoke little better than slavery itself" (Rerum Novarum, n. 2) we cannot shrug our shoulders and say "That is a disconcerting thought; let us banish it out of our minds by going off to sing Vespers". If somebody reminds us that "the immense number of proletarians on the one hand and the enormous wealth of the very rich on the other are an unanswerable argument that material goods are far from rightly distributed" (Quadragesimo Anno, n. 60) it won't do to reply "Quite! But so long as I can afford to buy a new Liber Usualis I'm not worrying!" We've just got to worry!

Perhaps you notice that the man next to you at Mass is a bit shabby. Has it occurred to you that this may be because his wage is not sufficient to support him and his family even in frugal comfort? He is kneeling beside you as a fellow-member of that Body of which St. Paul said "all the different parts of it make each other's welfare their common care" (I Cor. xii, 25). There are thousands like him - and their plight concerns you. In the bench in front of you is a young mother with a babe-in-arms who cries, and two small children who fidget. Do you get annoyed? Or do you reflect that perhaps she hasn't a decent home to live in but only a room in a tenement? There are thousands like her too, and they all concern you. Perhaps there is another girl there whom you happen to know is a war-widow. She is lonely now - the dreadful social evil of war took the joy out of her life. She is your sister in Christ. And there are thousands like her too.

Poverty, bad housing, war - these and all the other social evils such as industrial disputes, class hatred, racial enmity, gangsterism, dope-traffic, divorce, birth control, prostitution, alcoholism are all intimately bound up with each other. They are all sins against charity and justice; they are all opposed to the glory of God and the sanctification and salvation of men which are the objects of the liturgy. How could anyone inspired by the liturgy fail to burn with desire to fight against these evils?

All of us should therefore study not only Mystici Corporis and Mediator Dei, but also Rerum Novarum and Quadragesimo Anno; and we should seek ways and means to exercise the functions given to us in the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation.'

And now to the sociologists - all those who are keen to work for the solution of the social problem. You people have got a tremendous job on hand. You know perfectly well that the answer to these hideous evils does not lie in the material sphere alone. They cannot be cured just by better organisation of the State, more equitable adjustment of conflicting claims, wiser legislation, redistribution of wealth. The forces opposing your praiseworthy efforts are not just material forces. The whole social problem involves moral evil; it is a welter of sin - sin against charity, against justice; it is a rending of the unity of mankind which Christ our Lord came to establish in His Mystical Body.

If your means are limited to the material, and your motives to sympathy and pity for your fellow men, then what you are doing is not true Catholic sociology, but only humanitarianism. Your apostolate must have spiritual motives based on a spiritual foundation. It must be from your own spirituality that there wells forth your zeal.

Now how can you engage fruitfully in a social apostolate if your own spirituality is individualist? The two things do not fit one another. For the social apostolate you need social piety - that outlook and perspective which the liturgy gives to you. Immerse yourselves in the liturgy and you will see things aright.

The Pope reminds you that nothing can be done without a union of hearts and minds. "Then only will it be possible to unite all in harmonious striving for the common good, when all sections of society have the intimate conviction that they are members of one great family and children of the same Heavenly Father, and further, that they are 'one body in Christ and everyone members one of another', so that 'if one member suffer anything, all members suffer with it'" (Quadragesimo Anno, n. 137). But this is the very basis of the liturgy - our union in the Mystical body! Pope Leo XIII said that charity and justice can only come from the conviction "that each and all are redeemed and made sons of God, by Jesus Christ, the first-born among many brethren; that the blessings of nature and the gifts of grace belong to the whole human race in common, and from none except the unworthy is withheld the inheritance of the Kingdom of Heaven. 'If sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God, and co-heirs with Christ' " (Rerum Novarum, n. 21). What else is this but the view-point of the liturgy?

You know also that one of the root causes of the social problem is the spirit of individualism. Individualism is a product of the Reformation. The "new theology" taught that redemption was based on individual faith; it ruled out the saving power of the Church by which men joined to the Church are saved by her; it refused to see that what is saved by the Head is the Body of Christ - that salvation and sanctification of men is corporate. From this there naturally developed an individualistic type of piety, foreign to the spirit of the Church. The Catholic answer of the Counter-Reformation, through an emphasis (at that time quite necessary) on the juridic aspect of the Church, tended somewhat to overshadow the organic aspect; there was no adequate return to the spiritual founts of early ages - the Scriptures and the Fathers. This opened the way to Catholic individualism which was more in harmony with the current tendency. The liturgical movement of today is a reaction against the tremendous subsequent growth of an over-emphasised individual piety, to the detriment of social piety.

This spirit of individualism overflowed into civil society, and led in due course to unbridled competition, to laissez faire in economics, and to exploitation of the worker in the absence of collective (i.e. social) bargaining. Your studies of economic history have shown you that these evils could not flourish in the days of the medieval Guilds. I would remind you that these Guilds were closely allied to the corporate spirit of the liturgy. They all had their patron saints, their corporate worship, the Masses for deceased workers, their sharing of spiritual and even material benefits. They were living expressions of the doctrine of the Mystical Body. When that spirit perished, the Guilds perished, and the evil fruits of individualism appeared. Nothing was done for the working classes in a corporate or collective way; their plight grew worse and worse until the Industrial Revolution evoked, by a reaction of desperation, a social remedy of trade-unionism. Pope Leo XIII eagerly encouraged it because he saw that it had tremendous potentialities for good. But it needed spiritualising. So it was but a logical development when, only twelve years after Pope Leo, in Rerum Novarum, had called for a renewal of economic life, Pope Pius X followed up, in the Motu Pro trio, with a call for a renewal of liturgical life. The latter is the soul of the former. True social living can never be brought about except through true social spirituality.

Unionism - as also other expedients urged by Catholic sociologists - cannot work well without the spirit of sacrifice. Workers and employers have to deny themselves in many ways for the common good. They have to give up much of their independence, and sacrifice time, energy and often money for any collective action. They have to be welded into a unity.

The spirit of sacrifice and the spirit of oneness must burn within them. These, however, are precisely the dispositions which the liturgy aims to produce in men's hearts. It is corporate worship, inducing unity. Its "principal act is the august sacrifice of the altar which must therefore be the source and centre of all Christian devotion" (Mediator Dei, n. 214).

The liturgy impresses on us that in the Mass we offer ourselves to God, through and with and in the Divine Victim. We must give up all hatred, ill will, jealousy and uncharitableness towards our fellow-men. "If thou art offering thy gift at the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath anything against thee, go first to be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift" (Matt. v, 23, 24). The liturgy urges us to full participation in the sacrifice by Holy Communion wherein we attain union, not only with God, but with each other. For therein we share our very life with our fellow men. We share our true life, our life of grace. Our physical lives are many, multiplied by the existence of our separate physical bodies; but our life of grace is one - the same Christ-life shared by all His members. Liturgical worship, therefore, is a powerful means for producing the spirit of sacrifice and of unity which alone can cure social ills. This spirit in men's worship will reach out into their work - their social intercourse, and help to renew all things in Christ.

Hence all who are engaged in the social apostolate have a vital need for the social spirituality of the liturgy. It is not merely by legislation, by economic plans, or through humanistic pity that society can be saved; only through the grace of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ can natural society be made to grow and flourish for the good of men and the glory of God.

In this country we have many groups of Catholics labouring for various ends which have inspired their enthusiasm. Of all these there are none who should be more ready to appreciate the value of the liturgical movement than those dedicated to the social movement. The two are so closely interconnected that they cannot be considered apart except at the cost of distorting both. They are the same thing under different aspects, namely, the activity in work and in worship of the Mystical Body of Christ. When the liturgical movement is more generally and properly valued by Catholic reconstructionists in this country, then - and only then - will the Catholic social movement develop the full efficacy which is inherent in it.

It happens that I am writing this on the Fourth Sunday after Easter. Meditate for a while on the Prayer which the Church gives us at Mass today: "O God, by whose action the faithful are united in good will, incline Thy people everywhere to love what Thou commandest and to desire what Thou dost promise; so that, among the changes of this world, our hearts may be set upon the one true home of joy." If this prayer of the liturgy were fulfilled, there would exist no social problem! Let us all, then, pray and work together "that in all and above all Christ may reign and rule, to Whom be honour and glory and power for ever and ever" (Quadragesimo Anno, n. 147).