This was announced last week, but since I knew nothing about this man, I refrained from posting and let others do the heavy lifting. Benedict named Sri Lankan Archbishop Albert Malcolm Ranjith Patabendige Don, who is now serving as apostolic nuncio to Indonesia and East Timor, as secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship. (Where Arinze is still #1)

Born in the Kurunegala diocese of Sri Lanka in 1947, Albert Malcolm Ranjith Patabendige Don was ordained to the priesthood in 1975, and appointed an auxiliary bishop of Colombo in 1991. In 1995 he became Bishop of Ratnapura, and in 1998 he came to Rome to serve on the staff of the Congregation for Evangelization. He was named apostolic nuncio to Indonesia and East Timor in April 2004.

Archbishop Patabendige, whose work in Rome drew the attention of Pope Benedict XVI some time ago, came to wider prominence in April 2004 with an article in L’Osservatore Romano defending the Vatican Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum and condemning liturgical abuses. His selection for the number two position in the Congregation for Divine Worship ends speculation in which the names of French Bishop Jean-Louis Brugues and the English Benedictine Abbot Cuthbert Johnson were also mentioned.

The new secretary replaces Sorrentino who was, as you might recall, recently named Bishop of Assisi

Today, Rocco has pulled some of the new secretary’s writings:

In the difficult post-conciliar years, certain theological trends sought to present these two manifestations of the same reality as opposite poles. Some, therefore, justified certain experiments in liturgical matters as "a right" of the local Churches, without even considering the universal nature of the Church and the damage such experiments could cause.

I also believe that another cause of the crisis is neglect of or insufficient insistence on the aspects of the mystery and the mysticism of the sacrament. What happens on the altar really is a mystery for it is invisible to our eyes. Jesus in the Eucharist gives himself ceaselessly to the heavenly Father and to his brothers and sisters, while he becomes God-sacrificed-for-us and our spiritual and heavenly food. The bread and wine are truly changed, through a mystery of faith, into the real Body and Blood of Christ. He continues what he began on Calvary, offering himself as a sacrifice for the expiation of our sins in a continuous process of cosmic liberation, hence creating the "new heavens and a new earth" (II Pt 3:13).