I thought you were only talking about the Eucharist. Obviously, in choir dress the cassock is quite necessary. It sounds horrendous. I have lived where the temperature is higher but the humidity low. It was far from pleasant but more bearable. The humidity just makes life intolerable for me. I once spent a time in the tropics. It was an absolutely miserable time for me unless I was near air conditioning and had a large glass of cold water in hand.
I just came across mention of a 2020 Barna survey which revealed that 70% of US RCs believe they can earn a place in heaven by doing good, and only 28% believe they would go to heaven because they've confessed their sins and accepted Christ as Savior. People who identified as Mainline Protestants, Evangelicals, and Born-Again Christians all had a much more favorable result in the survey. This shows that the RC liturgy and catechism are failing to properly teach their laity the most vital thing for which the church exists.
The lesson of the XXth century is that the liturgy is not to be paid attention to, since it can be changed at a whim.
Hymnwirters might be the barometer. We seem to have moved from the objective to the subjective, from the transcendent to the immanent, and seemingly in many situations seek to make the liturgy the handaid of the music (music that was generally born outside the liturgy) which is entirely the reverse of how it should be. I wonder when the next time we will sing 'Immortal Invisible ...' however I will not be holding my breath!
What's all the obsession with dressing up to do communion though. Why is it considered necessary by some really religious zealots for a celebrant to get all togged up like a 3rd Century Roman Civil Servant or Magistrate BEFORE he's allowed to preside at a Eucharist. Fashionable as it may have been in 370-600AD or thereabouts. Did Jesus wear all that fancy stuff when he did it for real? I don't think so. Is is nice - yes. Is it essential - no. Still it does look pretty, colourful and impressive I suppose. Better even than the dancing girls get up in the video. Ritual, smoke, music and sumptuous dressings up, does not a Holy Eucharist necessarily or essentially make. .
Hmm, yes. The beauty of holiness, yes, as if holiness can be visually seen by human eyes and if not seen, is not there. I'm not against the notion that a celebration of our freedom from condemnation won by Jesus Christ should include 'dressing up', 'singing songs', 'making scented smoke' and a 'man' saying the words, (though a woman would probably do just as well for me). I'm just against the idea that all these things HAVE be going on for the magic to work and the 'change' to actually take place, for our sins to be actually forgiven. All about doing the ritual right, being a 'ritualist' believer. Since some churches in the Church of England started doing all this back in the 19th century, due to High Church and Oxford Movements, (it didn't before then), some 'believers' have mistakenly begun to think it has made us all closer in 'getting it right' like the Roman Catholic church, which of course is really the properly 'Christian' church, in their opinion perhaps. The danger with all of this is when a local church only ever celebrates Eucharists in this HIGH form of worship, but never meets together for fellowship and prayer for simply 'the breaking of bread and the prayers'. At that point - ritual, (having become an essential for that church), is replacing holiness. Merely performing ritual duties, (if the ritual has become for us the important factor). is not worshipping in spirit and in truth. .