What Does The Prayer Really Say?
W D T P R S

We haven’t yet heard much about Summorum Pontificum from Canadian sources.  However, in the Catholic Register, a Canadian paper, there is this article of interest. 

My emphases and comments.

Latin Mass increases diversity, says Archbishop Collins     
Written by Michael Swan, The Catholic Register  
Wednesday, 11 July 2007

TORONTO - For Toronto’s Archbishop Thomas Collins, more diversity equals less controversy [Can I believe my eyes?] in Canada’s Catholic community over liturgy.

“We celebrate Toronto as the most diverse diocese in the world. We’ve just been enriched. I think the whole church has.” Collins told The Catholic Register following the release of Pope Benedict XVI’s motu proprio, Summorum Pontificum, which declared the 1962 Latin Missal one of two approved forms of the Mass. “This is a great thing, and it solves all of this disputing and all this stuff.”

Greater availability of the old Latin Mass will mean people estranged from the church by introduction of the Novus Ordo version and its vernacular translation into English in 1970 will no longer have any reason to feel their church has taken something away from them.

In Collins’ view, rumours, gossip and controversy over Latin versus English have tied up the church for too long.

“There’s all this rumours and gossip and all these silly things. Now we have this wonderful document, and now we can move onto other things,” Collins said.

For Toronto’s 1.7 million Catholics, Mass is already regularly celebrated in 34 languages [Holy Cow!] – including five parishes where Latin Masses according to the 1962 Missal of Pope John XXIII are celebrated. As of Sept. 14, the date Summorum Pontificum comes formally into effect, priests will be able to celebrate the 1962 Latin Mass privately, with a small group of people, without obtaining an indult or special permission from the archbishop. Priests will also be permitted to use the 1962 breviary and to use old Latin formulations for Confessions, weddings, Anointing the Sick, and Baptisms. Bishops may use the 1962 Missal for Confirmations.  [And ordinations too, though I sure they won’t.]

Public Masses said on a Sunday morning in a parish at a scheduled time will still need the approval of the archbishop on the advice of his council of priests, said Collins. It will be up to bishops to decide whether there is a substantial and stable community requesting the Latin Mass in a parish, and whether the priest is capable of offering the Mass, he said.  [Actually, I believe this may be stepping across the line a little in terms of the provisions of the Motu Proprio.  For example, the M.P. does not say the group (coetus) must be "substantial" or "large".  A coetus would be at least three people, surely.  It can also include the priest himself!  And the issue really is left in the pastor’s hands, more than this statement implies. ]

“What we do in terms of anything more than individual priests and a few people coming to be with them – if you come to things like a semi, a quasi-parish – that would all have to be dealt with by the council of priests,” Collins said.  [Hmmm… it seems to me that the bishop can do this on his own.]

The archbishop said he intended to be as free as possible with granting permission, and even held out the possibility priests may begin to celebrate the Latin Mass privately with his permission before Sept. 14. All Masses throughout the world are said in the name of the local, ordinary or bishop [Hmm… I wonder if that is actually true.] who is the moderator of the liturgy and responsible for unity within the diocese.

Collins said he didn’t see a danger of liturgical elitism among enthusiasts for the older rite, or any threat to unity by offering an alternative to the Novus Ordo Mass. The 1970 vernacular Mass is the ordinary form of the Mass, and the 1962 version has been designated extraordinary.  [ARGH!  The same error keeps cropping up. LATIN is the normative language of the Novus Ordo.]

“The church assumes that a person celebrating the 1962 liturgy would not in principal object to celebrating the 1970 liturgy,” said Collins.

The archbishop believes the two forms of the Mass will enrich each other, and allow more Catholics to get in touch with the church’s rich liturgical tradition. “We can be enriched by the 1962 rite, so that’s a blessing for all of us,” Collins said.  [Excellent!]

Sunday Latin Masses are currently offered in Toronto at St. Vincent de Paul, 263 Roncesvalles Ave., Holy Family, 1372 King St. W., St. Theresa, 2559 Kingston Rd., Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ, 1 Resurrection Rd., every other week, and St. Patrick’s, 91 Church St., Schomberg.  [I like that this concrete information is provided.]

Collins puts the freer use of the 1962 Missal in the context of a coming renewal of the Novo Ordo Mass [YES!  Very well said!] which should be available in a new English translation within a year.

“The liturgy will vault forward in terms of the quality of English when the new translation is put into action,” he said.   [Nicely put. How refreshing!]
Collins said he was ready to welcome back any person or group who has split off from the Catholic church over the introduction of the Missal of Pope Paul VI and the vernacular.

“If the only issue in their breaking away from the church is that they were attached to the 1962 liturgy, well they would hardly have a reason for remaining broken away from the church. If they have other reasons, well that’s another problem, but they don’t have this reason.”

In the nation’s capital, Ottawa Archbishop Terrence Prendergast, S.J., welcomed Pope Benedict’s decision.

“The Pope’s action simultaneously affirms the Second Vatican Council’s teachings on the liturgy and seeks to return to active church life those drawn to the Mass as it was celebrated in Latin prior to 1970. These include older Catholics alienated from the Church since the Mass was changed and younger Catholics seeking worship that is evidently transcendent,” [The implication here is that it is easier to discern the transcendent in the older form than the newer.]  he said in a prepared statement released July 7.

Prendergast noted that the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter has been offering Latin Masses in the archdiocese of Ottawa since 1994. The archbishop said he hoped that this papal initiative will be “welcomed widely, studied carefully and implemented correctly in the archdiocese and elsewhere.”

What a nice article!   There were some good and refreshing comments from both those Canadian prelates.

Sr. Chittister is pretty worried.

On 10 July Sister produce what must be called an exemplary piece on the Motu Proprio and older form of Mass.  It perfectly conveys what Sister stands for.

Nearly a month later she has produce a fresh piece.  If you compare the two, you will find they are nearly identical.

I don’t need to produce here the newer version, from the National Catholic Reporter for 3 August 2007.  Just go read the the first from 10 July which has my comments with it. 

Since she first wrote about the Motu Proprio Sister has had almost a month to hone her razor sharp observations and polish the steel traps of her reasoning.

She just recycled what she wrote before, for the same publication.  Sometimes writers do that.

I suppose we can take it either that she is on vacation or this is the very best she can produce on the subject.

There is again something of interest from the Diocese of Winona on the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum.  You might remember the statement of His Excellency Most Reverend Bernard Harrington which you can review here.  I had also posted here a memo sent by that diocese’s liturgy office to the parish liturgists.  That memo, filled with errors, was not a little contrary to the public statement of the bishop.  The Director of Communications for the Diocese of Winona then wrote to me asking that I remove that memo from the liturgy office because it wasn’t intended to be public!  A remarkable thing that. 

The bishop made a public statement and, in the background, a memo is circulated which undermines the public statement.

I think I might need to return that memo to public view.

In any event, now we read this piece in The Courier, the newspaper of the Diocese of Winona, from that same Diocesan Director of Liturgy who produced that "private" memo. 

Take note in particular of her key insight: the two forms of Mass seem to be English and Latin.

My emphases and comments

   One Rite, Two Forms: The Mass, English and Latin

        By Peggy Lovrien,

    Diocesan Director of Liturgy

   
    Pope Benedict recently issued an apostolic letter, Summorum Pontificum, giving a parish priest permission [Not quite.  By stating that there is one Rite in two expressions, that will mean that any priest with faculties to say Mass at all has two forms to choose from, ordinary and extraordinary.  It is not really giving a separate permission.  It is more like expanding existing faculties.  The distinction is a fine one, I know.] to celebrate Mass in Latin. [WRONG!  you would think a Diocesan Director of Liturgy would no that the normal, the ordinary language of the Novus Ordo is Latin.  No priest needs permission to celebrate Mass in Latin.  Until 14 Sept. they need permission to use the older form of Mass.] Previously, a priest had to seek permission from the local bishop to celebrate Mass in Latin [again]  because the ordinary or normal [WRONG] way to celebrate Mass was in the language of the people. [The normal way to say Mass, any Mass, in the Roman Rite is in Latin. The vernacular is actually the exception to this rule.] Pope Benedict reinforced this idea referring to Mass in the vernacular [WRONG AGAIN.  He spoke about the Novus Ordo] as the ordinary form and Mass in Latin as the "other-than-ordinary" form or extra-ordinary form. The two forms are to be understood as two expressions of one rite.

    Last October, Times Online predicted the pope’s statement permitting the celebration of the Tridentine Mass saying that it might help bring followers of excommunicated Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre of France back to the Roman Catholic Church. It "would permit any priest to introduce the Tridentine Mass to his church, anywhere in the world, unless his bishop has explicitly forbidden it in writing, Use of the Tridentine Mass, was restricted by most bishops after the reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65)" (Times Online, 10-11, 2006 by Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent).

    We might ask what the difference is between the Tridentine Mass [an inaccurate, but useful term] and the present day Mass. [Ehem… remember.  The older form of Mass is also "the present Mass", or rather "a present Mass".  Right?]  The Tridentine Mass, written in 1570 [Oh for pit’s sake!]  after the council held in Trent, Italy, is now referred to as the Mass of the "1962 Missal" We call the Mass we celebrate daily in English the "New Mass" or the Novus Ordo. Pope Paul VI published it in 1969 after the second Vatican Council. Its goal, above all else, was the full, conscious, and active participation of the people in the liturgy. [I can hardly wait to see what this author says about active participation.] Pope John Paul II republished it in 1975 [which was really a good trick for him, seeing that he wasn’t elected Pope until 1978!] and in 2000 produced a new edition of the New Mass.

    The church writes the first text of the Mass in Latin. Then the New Mass (the present day Mass) a translation of the Latin text into the vernacular language, that is, the language of the people.  [Noooo… the Novus Ordo Missale Romanum is in Latin and there are translations of it into the vernacular.  This is so sloppy.]

    Prior to Pope Benedict’s statement, a priest could decide to celebrate the present day Mass in Latin (Novus Ordo) at any time [Okay!  This is good!]  but was restricted from using the Mass texts from the Tridentine Mass formulae. He would have to get permission from the local bishop to celebrate the Tridentine Mass. Pope Benedict has removed the requirement to get permission from the local bishop.  [Right.]

    The vernacular text evolved as the result of careful research and scholarly work by church clergy prior to the Second Vatican Council.  [WHAT!?  How could dozens of vernacular translations evolve before the Latin text existed?  What a mess.] The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy (CSL), the first document of the council, articulated the result of their scholarly work and called for the use of the people’s language in the liturgy. [Noooo…. the text of Sacrosanctum Concilium did not call for the vernacular.  It called for Latin to be preserved as the language of the liturgy while opening the possibility that the vernacular could be used for some parts of the Mass in some occasions.]  Use of the people’s language was a value because it allowed people to knowledgeably participate in the liturgy through full, conscious, and active participation. [This is very narrow.  It suggests that people cannot participate at Mass if the Mass is not in the vernacular.]  The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy laid the groundwork for the New Mass of 1969 (Novus Ordo).

    PRAYER TEXTS

    Since the vernacular language allowed people to understand what the Mass prayers, the Eucharistic prayers, Scripture, and music texts were saying, people internalized the sacred texts of the Mass. [sigh… whaddy gonna do?] The liturgy transformed the people into the presence of Christ [What on earth?  As if it didn’t before?] - hence, the personal need [??] to be at the liturgy every Sunday to experience this transformation. As agents of the presence of Christ in the world (mission) to non-believers, Catholics become living disciples reaching out to those in need of love, faith, compassion, and dignity.  [Correct me if I get this wrong, but is she suggesting that before there was a vernacular liturgy, the missionary mandate of the Church was not being fulfilled?]

    SCRIPTURE

    These past 38 years, the people of God have been reading the Bible in the celebration of the New Mass (Novus Ordo).  [I don’t know about that.  I think they read and listen to Scripture pericopes.  I also think that there were Scripture readings before the Council.] After the council, cardinals, bishops, and priests [?] organized the Bible into a three year reading cycle of Scriptural readings that included the Old Testament, the pastoral letters of St. Paul and the Acts of the Apostles, and the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke called the synoptic gospels. The gospel of John appeared at key points during Christmas and Easter seasons. They also composed a collection of a two-year cycle of readings for weekdays. These books, called the Lectionary, gave the people the opportunity to become familiar with a bigger portion of the Bible through systematic liturgical reading. The old Mass, on the other hand, had a one-year cycle of Scripture readings.

    IN THE MASS

    In the introductory part of the New Mass, the Church Fathers [Ehem….] placed a penitential rite within the Mass, which became a dialogue of prayer between the priest and all the people. This replaced the old penitential "prayers at the foot of the altar," recited only by the priest and servers before Mass.

    In the Novus Ordo Mass of today, we speak of two parts of the Mass: the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist often referred to as the twin tables:

    "The Mass is made up, as it were, of two parts: the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. These, however, are so closely interconnected that they form but one single act of worship. For in the Mass the table both of God’s word and of Christ’s Body is prepared, from which the faithful may be instructed and refreshed." (CSL, 56 and GIRM, 28)

    The Tridentine Mass called the Liturgy of the Word the Mass of the Catechumens because the catechumens could participate only in the first part of the Mass (a practice revived today through the Rites of Christian Initiation of Adults or RCIA). It included a reading of one of the New Testament letters (epistles) of St. Paul and one of the four Gospels. It labeled the Liturgy of the Eucharist the Mass of the Faithful because the catechumens were not allowed in this part of the Mass until they became one of "the faithful" through baptism. The Church also revised the old offertory prayers of the Tridentine liturgy to avoid a duplication of texts with the Eucharistic prayer texts.

    The Tridentine Mass used only one Eucharistic prayer (Eucharistic prayer I). In the New Mass, however, there are nine Eucharistic prayers: four for Sunday and weekday use, two for Masses focusing on reconciliation and three for Masses with children. Eucharistic prayer II comes from one of the early Church Fathers, Hippolytus, who wrote some of the fIrst descriptions of the liturgy in the Apostolic Traditions of 215 AD. His writings gave scholars insight into the way the early Church celebrated the Mass only 160 years after Christ.

    Today, communicants receive the Eucharist under the forms of both bread and wine, the Body and Blood of Christ. In the old Mass, due to medieval plagues and lack of public health practices, communicants could receive only the Body of Christ.  [WHAT???]

    DIALOGUE PRAYER

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