Cardinal Francis Arinze was asked last summer what he thought of liturgical dance. Here's what he answered.

Has liturgical dance been approved for Masses by your office?

There has never been a document from our Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments saying that dance is approved in the Mass. The question of dance is difficult and delicate; it is not easy.

However, it is good to know that the tradition of the Latin Church has not known the dance. It is something that people are introducing the last 10, or 20 years. It was not always so. Now it is spreading like wildfire, one can say in all the continents, some more than others. In my own continent, Africa, it is spreading, in Asia it is spreading. Now some priests and lay people think that Mass is never complete without dance.

The difficulty is this: We come to Mass primarily to adore God, what we call the “vertical dimension.” We do not come to Mass to entertain one another. That's not the purpose of Mass; the parish hall is for that. When we come to Mass we don't come to clap, we don't come to watch people, to admire people.

We want to adore God, to thank him, to ask him pardon for our sins and to ask him for what we need.

Don't misunderstand me. Because when I said this in one place, somebody said to me, “You are an African bishop! You Africans are always dancing! Why do you say, ‘We don't dance’?” A moment. We Africans are not always dancing. Moreover, there is a difference between those who come in procession at offertory, they bring their gifts with joy. There's a movement of the body, right and left, they bring their gifts to God. That is good, really. And some of the choir, they sing, they have a little bit of movement; nobody is going to condemn that.

But when you introduce wholesale ballet, then I want to ask you, “What is it all about? What exactly are you arranging?”

It is possible that there could be a dance that is so exquisite that it raises people's minds to God and they are praying and adoring God, and when the dance is finished, they are still wrapped up in prayer.

Is that the type of dance you have seen? Most dances that are staged during Mass should have been done in the parish hall. And some of them are not even suitable for the parish hall. I saw in one place, I will not tell you where, where they staged a dance during Mass, and that dance was offensive.

It broke the rules of moral theology and modesty. Those who arranged it, they should have had their head washed with a bucket of holy water.

— Ellen Rossini