September 25, 2026

The Church in Our Time: The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy

Criterion staff report

ArchIndy Vox pocast logoEver wonder why the Mass unfolds the way it does—the postures, the silence, the words repeated every week?

In this episode of ArchIndy Vox’s series on the Second Vatican Council, host Ken Ogorek, executive director of the archdiocesan Secretariat for Evangelizing Catechesis, talks with liturgist Tammy Becht and Father Patrick Beidelman, former executive director of the archdiocesan Secretariat for Worship and Evangelization, about “Sacrosanctum Concilium,” which is the Latin title of the council’s 1963 “Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy.”

They unpack a phrase many Catholics may have heard but few have stopped to define—“full, conscious and active participation”—and what it asks of people in the pew.

They also explore how the document explains Christ’s presence throughout the liturgy, in the priest, in the Eucharist, in Scripture and in the assembly’s prayer and song; why the liturgy has real rules rather than “whatever feels good”; and how the 60-year-old text still shapes ongoing changes in the Church, from new translations to the Order of Christian Initiation for Adults process.

It’s a good entry point for anyone curious about what the Vatican II document states and why it still matters in every liturgy.

Listen on any major podcast platform or watch on the Archdiocese of Indianapolis’ YouTube channel by searching @IndianaCatholic. †

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