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PCED response about TLMs for children
One of the WDTPRSers sent me a copy of an interesting response to a question put to the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei.
I don’t have the original letter of the sender containing the question(s), but we can perhaps discern what was going on.
Here is the main part of the PCED response:
You raise the question as to whether school children are permitted by right to be exposed to the celebration of the Eucharist in the extraordinary form provided all necessary catechesis is offered. the answer is obviously positive.I am guessing that the question we put to the PCED because someone suggested to the writer that TLMs are too hard for children, that Latin isn’t appropriate for them.
Of course, they are permitted to be exposed to the celebration of the Mass according to the extraordinary form. No doubt, a number of them already assist at this Mass with their parents on Sunday.
We trust the the priests of the Institute of Christ the King and those who collaborate with them will help engage the children’s participation in some way with songs or chants. we would also suggest that the readings for Masses be read in the vernacular as this is in full accord with the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum and could further help to maintain their attention.
A couple things. First, we don’t know what age "school children" are. They might be 6 or 16, with rudimentary English or, perhaps home-schooled with Latin. Common sense must be used.
Also, from the onset after the text of the Motu Proprio was released I spoke of my option that the vernacular could be used during TLMs. That doesn’t mean I think it should: I am saying that Summorum Pontificum permitted it (as did the PCED’s guidelines many years ago). I am not sure about the best way to handle this, however. Perhaps the priest could do as he would during a low Mass on a Sunday, leave the altar and read the readings a second time. Perhaps he would not read in Latin, but rather read them in English. Perhaps someone else would read them in English while Father was reading them normally in Latin. I don’t know.
However, what the PCED wrote was a suggestion. It can be taken or not.
Also, songs and chants could be used to "engage the children’s participation". Well… okay. But I suppose that means having Missa cantata. Otherwise are we now into the thorny problem of the role of "hymns" and "songs" versus the actual liturgical texts of the Mass? I don’t know.
Another thing, and interesting, is that children have the right to be exposed to the TLM. They have a right. If they have a right, then pastors of souls have a duty to respond. And since there are children pretty much everyone, as memory serves, then pastors of souls pretty much everywhere have the duty to see that the rights of those children are being met.
Furthermore, since children themselves don’t know their rights or know clearly what is good for them, and they might even from time to time resist what is good for them, pastors of souls should nevertheless persevere in building up the TLM in parishes.
By extension, adults also have these rights. Pastors of souls should also see to the needs of their spiritual children even if no request has been made.
TLM is too hard for children? Children have attended TLM for centuries. Are kids now that much stupider? I hope not!
Comment by Antonia — 29 July 2008 @ 5:13 pmMy sister-in-law’s mother told me she still remembers the Latin responses she was taught by the nuns at Scare Coeur in the 1940s when she was a primary school girl, so I can hardly see why today’s children are any less likely to be able to cope.
Comment by Michael Stevens — 29 July 2008 @ 5:18 pmAt a recent talk on participation at the TLM given by Fr. Tim Finigan, after a comment from one parishioner saying that the “yoof” don’t understand the TLM, one youngster put up his hand, and chimed in with the response, “I like Latin!”
He was about 6 years old.
One of our regular servers at the Saturday morning Low Mass is 10 years old. He’s happy to make the responses.
And we have a whole bunch of youngsters keen to serve the TLM as soon as they’ve made their First Holy Communions.
And, in the pews, several little girls have been spotted following the words of the Creed in their Mass books…
I am inclined to wonder whether the constant talking down to young people at the Mass over the past 40 years, removing all sense of the special and sacred from the liturgy, and desperate attempts to make the Mass “relevant” to “yoof” by means of guitars, tambourines, drums and cringingly bad pop songs have been the biggest factors in the decline in numbers of young people attending Mass.
Comment by Mac McLernon — 29 July 2008 @ 5:27 pmPersonally, I would like to hear the psalm in English.
Instead of the current call-and-response format (which is usually banal and seems to revolve around the ‘psalm leader’), I would like to hear the entire congregation read the psalm together in english… without the antiphons for each stanza.
Comment by LCB — 29 July 2008 @ 5:27 pmShould clarify, my first sentence references TLM. The 2nd sentence references the NO.
Comment by LCB — 29 July 2008 @ 5:27 pmSince I work at a K-8 Catholic school this question is very interesting to me. I doubt that at our modern suburban parish we will ever have the TLM available to the children. My guess is that many of the parents have never even heard of Summorum Pontificum. However, it seems to me that the kids should at least be taught about the TLM in the classroom. This is part of their Catholic heritage. They do have a right to know about it. If this is their right, shouldn’t Catholic schools have a duty to teach it? Any advice on how one might approach a school principal about this?
Comment by Rose in NE — 29 July 2008 @ 5:29 pmMy two sons, ages ten and eleven, have known no other Mass other than the TLM.
They both serve at the Altar and know the Our Father, Hail Mary, Hail Holy Queen, and Glory Be to the Father in Latin.
Comment by Brian — 29 July 2008 @ 5:36 pm“...Also, from the onset after the text of the Motu Proprio was released I spoke of my option that the vernacular could be used during TLMs. That doesn’t mean I think it should: I am saying that Summorum Pontificum permitted it.”
Comment by Christopher Mandzok — 29 July 2008 @ 5:37 pmI am puzzled as to why so many “traditionalist” have a distaste for a vernacular Tridentine rite. The language and words of the Tridentine Mass are beautiful. If I was to compare the Tridentine rite to poetry, it is the most beautiful poem that I have ever heard. I would never want to take its beauty away from a fellow Catholic or pagan for that matter. I concede that the Latin is just as beautiful and just as easy to learn, however I view this as a battle to convert souls to the Mass of all time. “Traditionalists” would be surprised how Latin can turn people away from the Tridentine rite. Again, I see nothing wrong with the Tridentine rite performed in English, and I believe that it would change novus order Catholics to “our” side.
Isn’t it sad that someone had to write the PCED for an answer to this “no-brainer” question. Obviously there was a pastor or liturgy committee out there who is resisting the expressed wishes of the Holy Father and the Universal Church. Until bishops get with the Pope’s “Marshall Plan” for the Church, I think it’s going to be very difficult just to get dioceses to encourage and give the right for “school children” (K-12) to sing the parts of the Mass in the Ordinary Form in Latin, much less the Extraordinary Form. Don’t get me wrong, I realize that “brick by brick” we are making progress albeit slowly, but eventually “brick by brick” needs to accelerate to “wall by wall.” How long, O Lord, how long?
Comment by TNCath — 29 July 2008 @ 5:43 pmThe one [FSSP] Extraordinary Form Mass I attended had the priest repeat the readings in English instead of starting his homily – the congregation present made, once again, the customary signs and actions. Given that most people are not fluent in Latin and that the homily is in the vernacular, it makes little sense to me not to have the readings read in the vernacular [at whatever point, instead of Latin or not]. I would, however, prefer to maintain the reading of the readings in Latin at their proper time, but then, I like Latin.
Comment by Hidden One — 29 July 2008 @ 5:47 pmMy kids’ school in Indianapolis has daily Mass, with the Ordinary Form in English on Monday and the EF Tuesday through Friday. Works great.
Comment by therecusant — 29 July 2008 @ 5:58 pmOFTEN WHEN APPROACHING THOSE WHO COULD INTRODUCE MORE LATIN INTO THE LITURGY,ONE GETS THE REPLY,O, THEY WOULD NOT UNDERSTAND LATIN. Well,what’t to stop people learning Latin. We were not born speaking latin.
I often say to those who put forward the argument ” they won’t know what is going ” regarding the Latin mass. Well ,what about those in Ireland, during the penal days, who attended at the Mass Rock.Did they know what was going on
Comment by Petros — 29 July 2008 @ 6:00 pmWhat a crop of Protecatholic bullcaca.
Comment by rosie — 29 July 2008 @ 6:04 pmThe one [FSSP] Extraordinary Form Mass I attended had the priest repeat the readings in English instead of starting his homily – the congregation present made, once again, the customary signs and actions.
I am at the opposite extreme, having attended more TLM’s than I could possibly count or remember. And—although the vernacular re-readings may be omitted at a weekday low Mass—I cannot recall a single Sunday Mass in a over a half-century-plus period that did not follow exactly the pattern you describe, with the readings first read in Latin at the altar, then in the vernacular at the pulpit.
Comment by Henry Edwards — 29 July 2008 @ 6:06 pmThe school in question serves children 4-14. The original letter to Msgr Perl stated that the school children attend a Catholic school connected to a Novus Ordo parish. The priests of the Institute of Christ the King serve the neighboring parish and wish to make available the Extraordinary Form once a month for the school children.
So the question posed to Mgsr Perl asked if Catholic school children, during regular weekday school Masses, have a right to be exposed to both forms of the Roman rite given the ready access of the priests of the Institute.
Comment by Terry — 29 July 2008 @ 6:33 pmI have at this juncture attended only 5 EFs in my adult life. Only at one were the readings done in English using the DRV. It was graet.
The one Solemn Mass for Laetare Sunday Fr Cipolla gave a grat sermon on the Introit for that Sunday. I personally would prfer to see the readings kept in Latin with a rereading in the vernacular either at the pulpit or outside the Sanctuary. The Mass needs to be seen as a fabric, a delicate work of art with which one must not trifle. The custom of the Eastern Churches is to have the homily after the Liturgy since one has by entering the Liturgy left ordinary time thus the homily is deliberately outside the Liturgy. One must be careful of falling into the sad dare I say error of making the Mass a didactic session. It was with this assumption and goal that some took a meat cleaver to the Mass. In terms of exposing children to the EF, the sensibilities and the reverence of the EF are such that much is taught without words but with gestures and attitude which I think make more of an impression on younger minds. Assisting my Pastor vesting for Mass as a child of 10 I recall vividly the reverence and peacefulness of this excercise with both servers in attendence. He was clearly murmuring a prayer as he did so. I recall the amice, the cincture and the alb. I recall one of us having to assist with the cincture. I recall the reverence with which he said even the 1970 Mass. By his calm recollected manner without bruising a reed with out giving the impression that”let’s get this show rolling “kind of attitude,he taught very powerfully the Love of the