CASEL, ODO. — Distinguished liturgist and Benedictine theologian, born on 27 September 1886 at Coblenz-Lützel, died at the abbey of S. Croce di Herstelle on 28 March 1948. Having completed his secondary studies at Andernach, he entered the abbey of Maria-Laach in 1905, where he professed his vows in 1907 and was ordained a priest on 17 September 1911.
He received his doctorate in theology at S. Anselmo in Rome with a dissertation on the Eucharist in s. Giustino, and in philosophy at Bonn with the dissertation: De philosophorum graecorum silentio mystico (Bonn 1919). These first fruits already indicated his intellectual orientation. Returning to Maria-Laach, with two fundamental monographs—Das Gedächtnis des Herrn in der alchristlichen Liturgie (Ecclesia Orans, no. III, Freiburg im Br. 1918) and Die Liturgie als Mysterienfeier (no. IX of the same collection, ibid. 1922)—he revealed the originality of his thought and the novelty of his philological methods. From 1921 to 1941, through the dense pages of the Jahrbuch für Liturgiewissenschaft, which he founded and directed with exceptional constancy, he progressively developed his ideas, defending them against the many and vigorous attacks of his opponents, clarifying them in the light of new studies (which he extensively reviewed) and of incessant criticism. The principal works of this fruitful twenty-year period are: Mysterium und Martyrum (in Jahrb. f. Lit. Wiss., 2 [1922], pp. 18–38); Das Mysteriengedächtnis der Messliturgie (ibid., 6 [1926], pp. 113–204); Mysteriengegenwart (ibid., 8 [1928], pp. 145–224); Das christlichen Kultmysterium (Regensburg 1932); Neue Zeugnisse für das Kultmysterium (in Jahrb. f. Lit. Wiss., 13 [1935], pp. 99–171); Glaube, Gnosis und Mysterium (ibid., 15 [1941], pp. 155–306).
In these works, taking as his point of departure the mystery-concept of religion, which Jesus Christ is said to have supernaturalized, he affirms that the essence of Christianity consists in the physical union of Christ with the Church, realized through the liturgy, in the course of which (in the sacrifice as in the Sacraments, in the sacraments as in the Divine Office) the presence of Jesus Christ and of all his saving action (Incarnation, Passion, Resurrection, parousia) is involved, so that the entire saving drama of Christ is re-founded, repeating itself, in his mystical members. This mysterious “re-presentation” of the whole economy of salvation remains below divine omnipresence, but surpasses the limited natural presence of bodies, souls, and angels; rather, it follows the law of a supernatural, pneumatic, sacramental presence. In this conception, the Mass must be considered a sacrifice because, in its unfolding, it re-presents (renders present once again) the same (numerically) immolation of Calvary, which, by virtue of transubstantiation, acquires a new quando and a new ubi. These singular ideas made the name of C. widely known throughout Germany, Belgium, and England. Today his fame is crossing the frontiers of the Latin world amid the enthusiastic welcomes of France; Italy has not yet stirred. It was natural that two attitudes should emerge around so striking a personality and such novel ideas: that of fervent disciples (Warnach, Dekkers, Winzen) and sincere admirers (Vonier, De Séguier, Rahner, Scheller, Goossens, Masure, Héris), as well as that of critics, at times benevolent (Coppens, Stohr, Poschmann, Prüm, Hoffmann), and sometimes severe (Soenghen, Hanssens, above all Umberg). We are still far from the consensus that should make Caselian ideology acceptable, but although the work is still sub indice, the figure of the pious and learned Rhenish monk stands out clearly in the firmament of Christian scholarship and piety.