What Does The Prayer Really Say?
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I posted this last year.  But I put so much work into it that it deserves recycling.

Some time ago, there was a discussion on one of our splendid Catholic blogs making mention of the burial place of St. Jerome perhaps in the Major Basilica of St. Mary Major in Rome. This is an interesting story and I dug into it a little. This is what I found.

We read in J.N.D. Kelly’s work Jerome: His Life, Writings, and Controversies (Duckworth, 1975, p. 333 – emphasis mine) :

Apocryphal lives extolling [Jerome’s] sanctity, even his miracles, were quick to appear, and in the eighth century he was to be acclaimed, along with Ambrose, Augustine, and Gregory the Great, as one of the four Doctors of the Church.[2] In the middle ages his works were eagerly copied, read, and pillaged; while towards the end of the thirteenth century the clergy of Santa Maria Maggiore, at Rome, were to persuade the public, perhaps themselves too, that his remains had been transported from Bethlehem to Italy, and could be venerated close to certain presumed fragments of the Saviour’s crib.[3]

Note 2: This was formally ratified by Pope Boniface VIII on 20 Sept. 1295: see Corpus iuris canonici II, 1059 (ed. E. Freidburg, Leipzig, 1879-81). The original number four (the list was later to be greatly expanded) was chosen so that the Doctors could match the Evangelists.

Note 3: The story of their alleged translation, in response to a visionary appearance of Jerome himself, is set out by J. Stilting in Acta Sanctorum XLVI, Sept. VIII, 636 (Antwerp, 1762); it is reprinted in PL 22, 237-40. Stilting also provides a discussion of its date, veracity, etc. on pp. 635-49.

In the Acta Sanctorum for 30 September, under the entry for St. Jerome, we find the following section with its articles:

LXV. Corpus Sancti ex Palestina Romam translatum, depositumque in basilica s. Mariae Majoris. The body of the saint was brought to Rome from Palestine, and put in the Basilica of St. Mary Major.
LXVI. Inquiritur tempus quo Sancti corpus Romam delatum. An investigation is made into the time when the body of the saint was brought back to Rome.
LXVII. Corpus Sancti depositum prope aediculam Praesepis, conditum deinde ibidem altare, sub quo positum, ubi mansit usque ad pontificatum Sixti V, quando dicitur clanculum ablatum & absconditum. The body of the saint was placed near to the small chamber of the Crib, established then right at the same altar, under which it was placed, where it remained until the pontificate of Sixtus V, when it is said to have been secretly taken away and hidden.
LXVIII. Corpus Sancti clanculum ablatum & absconditum dicitur, ne transferretur alio a Sixto V: deinde frequenter frustra quaesitum. The body of the saint is said to have been secretly taken away and hidden lest it were to be transferred to another place by Sixtus V: aftward it is frequently sought in vain.
LXIX. An reliquae, sub altari principe S. Mariae Majoris inventae, videantur illae ipsae, quae ut corpus S. Hieronymi ad illam basilicam fuerunt translatae. When the relics found under the main altar of St. Mary Major which had been transferred to that Basilica seem to be the very same as the body of St. Jerome.
LXX. Admodum verisimile & probabile inventas esse S. Hieronymi. Clearly the [relics] found are most like and probably of Saint Jerome.
LXXI. Respondetur ad objectionem ex reliquiis Nepesinis: reliquiae, quae verisimiliter sunt S. Hieronymi sub mensa principis altaris depositae. An objection is answered about the relics at Nepi: relics placed under the main altar which more than likely are those of St. Jerome.
LXXII. Reliquiae Sancti in pluribus civitatibus Italiae, Galliae, Germaniae, Belgii, & aliis provinciis. The relics of the saint in more cities in Italy, France, Germany, Belgium and other provinces.
LXXIII. Cultus S. Hieronymi: festivitates eius & Officia. The veneration of St. Jerome: his feasts and offices.

Here is the page where these articles begin. If you want to have a fuller experience of the joys (the chore) of reading the Acta Sanctorum for any length of time click here for a larger image.

His Excellency Most Reverend John T. Steinbock of the Diocese of Fresno has made a statement about the application of the provisions in the Pope’s Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum.

My emphases and comments.

 

Mass in Latin

Pastoral Message aired on KNXT-TV during October 2007

Bishop John T. Steinbock, Diocese of Fresno

My Dear People of God,

The document Pope Benedict XVI issued on July 7 regarding the use of the Latin Mass, reformed and published with the authority of Pope John XXIII in 1962, took effect in the Universal Church on September 14 of this year.  The Holy Father declared that both this 1962 Latin [grrrrr] Mass, referred to as the Tridentine Mass, [I know people recognize this term, but… grrrrr] and the Mass we now celebrate, [Well… there are those for whom the older Mass is "the Mass we now celebrate".  Hey wait a minute… as of 14 September, the older is really is "the Mass we now celebrate" just as much as the newer form.] the Mass of Paul VI published in 1970, form one and the same Rite.

The Holy Father has given permission to a priest, [This is incorrect.  The Motu Proprio is not constitutive.  It does not give permission.  It declares that priests have the use of either form if he already has permission (faculties) to say Mass at all. The Holy Father is declaring a fact rather than giving a permission.  This stems from the fact that the older form was never abrogated and it forms, at least juridically, part of one unified Roman Rite.] in Masses celebrated without the people, to celebrate the extraordinary form of 1962 in Latin, on his own authority.  He does not need permission of the Bishop.  Masses celebrated without people are private and non-scheduled Masses.  The Holy Father states that Christ’s faithful, with due observance of law, who spontaneously request it, may be admitted to these celebrations.

In parishes where a group of faithful attached to the previous liturgical tradition exists stably,[this is still not a great translation, but it is better to say "exists stably" than to say "stable group"] if the pastor is able, he is asked to accede to their requests  [this is well put] for the celebration of the Mass according to the rite of the Roman Missal published in 1962.  If a group of lay faithful does not obtain what it requests from the pastor, it should inform the diocesan Bishop. If he cannot provide for this celebration, the Holy Father says that the matter should be referred to the Pontifical Commission “Ecclesia Dei.”

As the Bishop of our Diocese, I have always allowed a Sunday Mass in Latin according to the 1962 Missal, both in the South and the North, the Bakersfield area and the Fresno area, for those people, coming from many different parishes, who have an attachment to the Mass in Latin. [grrrrr… I really think we need to make better distinctions.] I thank those priests who have provided this Mass through the years. [You’re welcome.  I was one of them for a short time when I was in Bakersfield.] It is a reality that there are very few priests left that are able to celebrate the Mass in Latin either in the ordinary or the extraordinary form.  [There will be a lot more real soon!]

I cannot foresee, at this time, a regular Sunday Mass in Latin in any other parishes, unless the pastor of a parish is personally able and willing to celebrate this Mass in Latin.  [This is the key, of course.  It is the pastor who deals with this question.]  Most priests are already celebrating two, three and sometimes four Masses, both on Saturdays and Sundays.  As the Bishop, I also have to tell everyone, quite frankly, that because of the shortage of priests, we are now preparing to have some of our parishes staffed, not by a priest, but by a Permanent Deacon, a Religious, or a Lay Person, who will be called a “Parish Life Coordinator.”  [Ouch.  This is a sad reality in some places.  In these cases, it is understandable that it would be very hard indeed to implement a regular celebration of the older Mass in a parish without a pastor.] This person will be in charge of leading the parish community, with a priest coming to celebrate Mass and hear Confessions when available.

Hopefully, the document of the Holy Father will have a significant impact in Europe, where relatively few faithful are coming to Mass on Sunday.  [Yes… we hope it will have a big impact on Europe.  We also hope that it will have an impact everywhere else too.  The Church everywhere needs renewal.]  Here in our Diocese, our parish churches, with multiple Masses, are filled with people, who experience a vibrant and devotional Sunday Liturgy.  [So wonderful that there can be no benefit from the provisions of Summorum Pontificum?  This makes it sound as if everything is just right in the Diocese of Fresno.  I suspect there are also issues there also.]  We are blest, in so many ways, but we are in great need of priests.  Let us pray for vocations especially from within our parish communities.   +

 

In the balance, this is a very good statement.  The bishop acknowledges that the pastor is the one who makes determinations about regular public celebrations in his parish.  He doesn’t seek to impose restrictions outside the provisions of the MP.  At the same time, he underscores the hard reality of things: there is a shortage of priests.

At the end, he makes an odd observation.  He seems to be saying that the MP is really intended for Europe, and doesn’t seem to be very relevant for the Diocese of Fresno.  He seems to be saying that the situation is great in the parishes there, which are full and vibrant.  This suggests that the reason the Holy Father gave us the MP was to help Mass attendance in those places where it is low (i.e., Europe, but not the San Joquin Valley).  However, in the previous paragraph the bishop explains that they are actually facing a dire situation: there is a shortage of priests.  It seems to me that things are decidedly un-wonderful where there are not enough priests for parishes.  Things are actually precarious if parishes have to be entrusted to lay custodians in the absence of priests.

I am convinced that the Motu Proprio is very much focused on the priest, his role and his identity.  The priest builds up the Church around himself at the altar.  He shapes the laity who then shape the world.  By renewing the identity of the priest by the derestriction of the older form of Mass, the Holy Father is also offering, I think, another way to increase priestly vocations. 

In any event, it is not my intention to pick at this statement, which is really pretty good.

Let us hope the people of that diocese will encourage vocations to the priesthood and give support to the priests they have.

I tip my biretta to the always engaging Diogenes for the links to what follows. 

Another Episcopalian has decided he can no longer endure the self-destruct mode that Church is vigorously wrapped up in.  So, he is swimming the Tiber.  Here is what he thinks about that.

So it’s off to Rome for me. I do not labor under the illusion all is milk and honey on the other side of the Tiber. It is not, the Roman Catholic Church, especially in the United States, is beset with woes, lousy liturgy and music being among the less egregious. But the Holy Catholic Church possesses something the Episcopal Church does not: sound doctrine, along with a Pope (especially the present one) and magisterium to ensure that it remains so. Sound doctrine will make it possible for me (I pray) to tolerate Masses where the priest sits in the Captain Kirk chair while the miasmal excrescences of Marty Haugen and David Haas [ROFL!] waft into the nave. And while my heartbreak over what happened to the Episcopal Church will remain with me to the end of my days (as I suspect it will for Fr. Kimel), at the same time I look forward with great joy to embracing the full Catholic Faith. I ask your prayers.

 

You’ve got em, and those of many of my readers. 

Corriere della Sera’s Luigi Accatoli has an article about the possibility of Pope Benedict celebrating Mass in the Basilica of St. Peter with the extraordinary use of the Roman Rite he derestricted with Summorum Pontificum.

Accatoli raises the interesting question of what would be done to substitute the old papal courtiers, abolished by Paul VI. 

Here are a couple excerpts (in my translation):

No Pontiff has usd the old Missal for 40 years: it could happen on 2 December

Luigi Accattoli

CITTÀ DEL VATICANO  – A new direction for culture and rites in the Vatican: Yesterday the Pope nominated Giovanni Maria Vian director of L’Osservatore Romano and consecrated as bishop the Milanese priset Gianfranco Ravasi who will have the role of "minister of culture"; in the next few days there is awaited the nomination of the new "master of ceremonies" to replace Archbishop Piero Marini.  After the arrival of the new master of ceremonies it is "probable" that the Pope will celebrate a Mass with the old rite, in St. Peter’s, obviously entirely in Latin: it could happen in 2 December, the first Sunday of Advent.
...
Nothing precise is known about the Pope’s intention to give bishops an "example" of his own choice to use the older rite, byeond the reception of requests of the faithful, as the Motu Proprio he published in July provides.  The rumor is circulating both on the lips of those who hope in such a gesture, which says that he would definitively clear "through customs" the old Missal which is still encountering resistance in spite of the recent derestriction; and also among those who fear that the Pope is making the gesture because it would be "another step away from the Council".

"Right now it’s only a rumor", says a monsignor who is neither for or against it, "but everyone is talking about it around here and I believe he is going to do it even if he risks stirring up some polemics, because Catholics who are less than 50 years old have never seen a Pope celebrate Mass with his back to the people and speaking the ‘Eucharistic Prayer’ in a low voice."  In the meantime, the ‘court’ which accompanied the Pope in these celebrations was abolished and I really want to see how an old papal Mass would be carried out today!"
....

 

The Jersey Journal has an article on the implementation of the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum in

My emphases and comments.

Church celebrates a return to traditional mass in Latin
Monday, September 24, 2007
By CHARLES HACK
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

At a solemn Latin Mass yesterday, the Holy Rosary Church in Jersey City heralded the return to favor of the once universal language of Christianity.  [Tell that to the Eastern Churches!]

The Sixth Street church yesterday held its first traditional Latin Mass to be officiated by a bishop [HUZZAH!] in almost 40 years, church officials said. Dom Carillo Gritti, bishop of Itacoatiara, Brazil, presided over the pontifical Mass just over a week after Pope Benedict XVI’s issued a "motu proprio" allowing priests to perform Latin Mass without permission of the bishop.  [Yep.]

The Latin Mass fell out of favor in the 1960s when the Church allowed Catholics to celebrate Mass in their local language. [What a wretched sentence.] The Rev. Rino Lavaroni, Holy Rosary’s pastor, conducts a traditional Latin Mass every Sunday, but this is the first time a bishop has officiated [Second time this word was used.  Odd.] over it since the 1960s.

Gritti sees the Pope’s order as an inevitable return to a centuries long tradition that saw a gap in the last few decades.

"Finally we have started again what was there forever," Gritti said. "We have to see this continuity in the Catholic Church."

"We can start the renewal that will transform our church and that will be the salvation for every person," Lavaroni added. "We are starting a new chapter with great enthusiasm."  [This guy gets it.]

Apart from the language, there are other differences to the service, Lavaroni said, including the fact that the celebrant does not face the people during prayer, because it is not a "social event," but communion with God.  [LOL!   Yep!  He does get it.]

Born in Bergamo in northern Italy, Gritti did most of his training in seminary there. But for more than 30 years, he has been in the Amazons in Brazil. A trained civil engineer, Gritti supervised the construction of his parish church and a local hospital.

The good thing in this article is that the priest clearly sees the connection between the use of the older form of Mass and the renewal we need in the Church.

Here is an interesting piece from the Pawtucket Times.

My emphases and com[]ments.

09/28/2007
Introibo ad altare Dei (I will go in to the altar of God)
By DONNA KENNY KIRWAN

[CLICHE ALERT!] PAWTUCKET - St. Leo the Great Church will be going back in time. Using a 1962 pre-Vatican II missal, the Rev. Kevin Fisette will celebrate Sunday Mass in Latin on Oct. 21 at 5 p.m.
The pastor will be wearing traditional vestments and during much [I hope all...] of the Mass, will be standing with his back to the congregation. Worshippers will have to kneel to receive Holy Communion, and the host will be placed on the tongue.
In one other notable difference, Father Fisette will be assisted by altar boys – no girls allowed.  [Isn’t it wonderful?]
While this hasn’t met with any resistance from parishioners, he did admit that one of his female altar servers, perhaps only half jokingly, responded with "Hey, that’s not fair!" when told of the Latin Mass rules.  [Poor little darlings.  But, perhaps one’s sense of "fair" needs to be adjusted.]
St. Leo’s, at 697 Central Ave., is the second church in Rhode Island to offer the Tridentine Mass. The other is Holy Name of Jesus Church in Providence, which has been offering the Mass for almost a decade by special permission from church authorities.
Earlier this year, Pope Benedict XVI lifted Vatican restrictions on the celebration of the Latin Mass, paving the way for more parishes to offer the traditional rite. However, as Father Fisette pointed out, there are many specific rules and regulations associated with it, which have been outlined by the Most Rev. Thomas Tobin, Bishop of Providence.  [Ehem… Summorum Pontificum doesn’t impose a lot of regulations.  I don’t think I have seen the "regulations" issued by the bishop of Providence.  Maybe someone will send them to me.]
"Bishop Tobin made it clear we can not mix rites, do a little of the old Mass and a little of the new," said Father Fisette. "Everything will be just as it was in 1962." He added that Bishop Tobin has been "extremely supportive" of his plan.
Father Fisette said he is excited about offering the Latin Mass and hopes that it will generate enthusiasm among his own parishioners, and perhaps attract some that are new.
Noting that weekly Mass attendance among Catholics has dropped about 40 percent in the last 40 years, Father Fisette said, "We have to do whatever we can to bring people back."
Father Fisette, who has been a priest for 26 years, said he realizes there are some who consider the practice a sign of the church going backwards.
He and other supporters of the Tridentine Mass view it as a return to a time of more sacred, traditional church values that were in place prior to the Second Vatican Council.  [I think it is a step into the future, not into the past.]
"Sometimes, I think we have lost a sense of the sacred. It’s all become very familiar," he said. "We would like to bring back the sense of mystery, if you will – back when people were more in awe of the Mass." He added that the Latin Mass celebration offers more in the way of "spiritual drama."  [All good insights.]
Commenting on the longtime practice of the priest turning his back to the congregation, [grrrrr] Father Fisette said that traditional thinking held that the old Mass was, essentially, the "priest’s prayer on behalf of the people who were gathered."
In contrast, the new Mass is centered around the idea that all of the people celebrate the Mass with the priest.  [Hmmm… well… this is true, though, isn’t it?   The baptized participate in their own way in Christ’s priesthood and unite their spiritual sacrifices to those of the priest during Mass, any Mass.]
Father Fisette said he sees the Latin Mass [grrrrr] as providing parishioners with another option of a traditional Catholic Mass.
"The Church is certainly big enough for different types of Masses. It is big enough for everybody’s spirituality," he said. "We have guitar Masses and Gregorian chants, why not the Latin Mass?" [grrrrrr]
Before arriving at St. Leo’s, Father Fisette was pastor of Holy Name Church, where he celebrated the weekly Tridentine Mass for seven years. He said that at Holy Name, there was a great deal of interest in the Latin Mass, even attracting a younger segment of the parishioners.
Father Fisette admits he is no Latin scholar, having only taken a couple of years of the ancient language in high school. However, when he was assigned to Holy Name in 1997, he decided to learn it himself. He said he used his mother’s old missal and watched a videotape as a guide. "I was tongue-tied at first, but I found that it was fairly easy to learn," he said.
He said he still intends to deliver his homily in English, however.  [HAR HAR HAR… insert knee slap here.  What a clever reporter!]
Because of all the different rules and practices involving the Latin Mass, Fisette said he plans to hold an instructional session for parishioners on Wednesday, Oct. 17, at 6:30 p.m. in St. Leo’s Church.  [An excellent idea.]
Following the inaugural Mass on Oct. 21, Father Fisette plans to celebrate a 5 p.m. Latin Mass on the third Sunday of each month for one year, to see if it catches on with parishioners. "I feel optimistic that it will," he stated.

 

All in all very positive news.  I like the fact that the bishop is supportive and that the priest will have sessions for the parish about the older form of Mass.  Also, I like Fr. Fisette’s interest in bringing people back to the Church.   This must be a priority for us now.