In the last post, we read of the possible consultation of bishops with their people. Even more important is the expected consultation with the CDWDS where liturgical experimentation is proposed:
66. The episcopal conference will present the proposal to the congregation before any experimentation takes place. The presentation should include a description of the innovations proposed, the reasons for their adoption, the criteria used, the times and places chosen for a preliminary experiment and an indication which groups will make it, and finally the acts of the discussion and the vote of the conference.
After an examination of the proposal carried out together by the episcopal conference and the congregation, the latter will grant the episcopal conference a faculty to make an experiment for a definite period of time, where this is appropriate. (SC 40)
Comments?
6 July 2011 at 8:23 am
What should be the criteria used for establishing, concluding and evaluating an experiment? Who should be involved in articulating the criteria?
Most importantly, to my mind, is how to assess the value of indifference. In my experience, the issues presented by adaptations are typically of the bar-bell curve kind – strong feelings pro and anti ay the ends, but indifference in the middle. Indifference can be hijacked, as it were.
One way to evaluate the value of indifference is to ensure that experiments come to a definite end point, and also then to assess how the ending of the experiment is received. Again, it’s likely to be a bar-bell curve, but perhaps with a slight or even marked shift.
And then there is the problem of formulating questions to elicit feedback in binary ways, which give poor data but are simpler to process (and easily gamed), as opposed to more open ended questions, which give better data but are more complex to process (and less easily gamed).