A long-time reader and WDTPRSer GS sent this useful e-mail:
Reverend Sir:
I just came across a concise roundup of currently published hand missals for the usus antiquior. Although the post is almost a year old, I don’t know of any new players in the field since then. The blog also refers to a Latin Mass Magazine article in the Spring 2008 issue. I know you’ve reviewed some of these, but this provides a very handy comparison of the various choices, and also a shortlist of changes made to the Mass from 1950-1962, plus Pope Benedict’s Good Friday prayer change.
The following missals are reviewed:
Saint Joseph Daily Missal: Bonaventure Press, 1953 reprint, no Latin for propers.
New Marian Missal: Mary Immaculate Queen Centre, January 1960 reprint, Latin/English for ordinary and some propers, by Father Sylvester Juergens, color illustrations in the original are reprinted in black and white.
Roman Catholic Daily Missal: Angelus Press, true 1962 Missal (newly typeset), Latin/English for ordinary and all propers, based on Father Juergens’ Ideal Missal 1962.Daily Missal 1962: Baronius Press, true 1962 Missal (newly typeset), Latin/English for ordinary and all propers, based on the Daily Missal and Liturgical Manual (16th edition) published by Laverty & Sons, Leeds, in 1960; real Moroccan leather cover.
Saint Andrew: Bonaventure Publication, 1945 reprint, the author wishes the Angelus and Baronius missals had been based on this one.
My Sunday Missal: Neumann Press, republished this missal for Sundays and principal feasts "explained by Father Stedman", updated for the revised Holy Week, Latin/English ordinary and all-English propers, very small form factor.
In studying various hand missal translations while preparing the monthly "worship aid" for the First Friday High Mass at St. Augustine, it has become apparent to me that the translations, even in the missals of the same name, changed dramatically between 1940 and 1962. There were at least three versions of English translation of the St. Andrew Missal alone in that time, the last of which demonstrated that awful ICEL principle of translating the qui clause of the collect as "you" instead of "who" (not to mention the sterile-looking illustrations). It’s no wonder we ended up with the ICEL slop we got — there was a clear trajectory.
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I have in my possession a Missal published before 1960 by (I think) the Newman Press of Westminster, Maryland, which already contains the mistranslations of pro multis, and if I am not mistaken, et cum spiritu tuo.
Moreover, I have a 1963 recording by a group called “Friends of the English Liturgy”, which features similar mistranslations, and the mentions the introduction of versus populum.
I have a hard time believing that the ICEL mistranslations were honest mistakes.
I have the Roman Catholic Daily Missal by Angelus Press and like the front containing all the necessay prayers and helpful points about the faith, rules for the US and Britain etc…Not sure if all the other printings have this as well…It also has the Kyrilie in the back….
Thanks for this post, Father. I own a Baronius Press Summorum Pontificum edition missal, which is so thick I could use it as a pillow in a pinch.
The reviews were great. However, while there was a picture at top of the Fr. Lasance missal, I could see no review of it, unless I somehow missed it. I must get a copy of the St. Andrew missal, if only for the maps (I love maps). Fortunately, my parents sell all three (Baronius Press, Fr. Lasance, and St. Andrew) on — warning: shameless plug dead ahead — their website (www.stjohnfisherforum.org).
As parochial school students at Immaculate Conception Parish in Arkansas in the late 1950s, we had the choice of the St. Joseph Missal or the St. Andrew Daily Missal. The St. Andrew missal was not the full version such as the reviewed 1945 reprint, but more of a student edition with few Latin propers and no kyriale, plus other simplifications. Both editions were published by E.M. Lohmann Co. of St. Paul MN. I still have my old missal, and it has none of the changes that took place after 1951. The St. Joseph missal was the most popular amongst kids by far, for reasons I could not then, nor now, explain. It was even simpler and had less Latin than the “student” St. Andrew, so I didn’t want that. Back then I really wished for, but never obtained, the full St. Andrew missal.
Radical changes began to take place in late 1965, so most of these missals were doubtless soon discarded. But one other pre-Vatican II item that I treasure is a priest’s standard ORDO for 1962, published by B. Herder. ORDOs of the pre-Vatican II era contained much more information than those that are published today, and were about the size of a hand missal and 200 pages long. It was given to me by an admired but now long-deceased assistant pastor when I was a altar server in 1962.
I agree, mostly, with the reviewer’s admiration of the full St. Andrew missal, with only one exception. The musical notation used throughout is *modern*. That is unimaginable! Other than that, it is a wonderful example of liturgical history before all the changes began occuring in 1951.
Today, I proudly use the Angelus Press Daily Missal (all the common sanctimony about the SSPX association be damned). It is overall the finest missal that I’ve ever seen. I spread my support to Baronius Press by purchase of their historic Douay-Rheims Bible.
I prefer the Baronius Press Missal to the Angelus (having used both). To answer Mitchell NY’s question, yes, the Baronius Press Missal has all of that stuff in it (and also Vespers and Compline for Sundays, etc etc) – the two are quite similar as to content – the principal differences are in presentation.
I think it ought to be noted that both Pius XII (in the early 50’s) and Bl John XIII (in 1960-62) promulgated changes to the MR – in the case of Pius XII, the revised Holy Week, and in the case of John XIII, rubrical changes, the addition of St Joseph to the Canon, and the removal of the word “perfidis” from the Good Friday Liturgy. Pope Benedict subsquently revised the same prayer.
Is it therefore not the case that re-prints of pre-1962 Missals might be less helpful, (for liturgical as opposed to study / private devotion purposes) than the Angelus and Baronius Missals, which use the text of the 1962MR?
Unless of course, one is a sedevacantist…
I normally use the Baronius Press one, but another helpful one to have is:-
The Layman’s Missal (& Prayer Book
for Sundays, Principal Feasts and Many Other Days
including the Liturgy of the Sacraments
with prayers and commentaries for Daily Use)
London, Burns & Oates, 2008
ISBN 9780860124429
Of course it is only for Sundays and Holydays, but it is a very good 2008 reprint of a translation of the Missele Quotidienne des Fidèles made in 1961. Only the Introits, Collects, Alleluias, Offertories, Communions and Postcommunions are in Latin, but it also has some Vespers Propers, Propers of many places (e.g. my native Scotland), and a whole host of intructional matter on 6 of the 7 sacraments – most handy!
p.s. sorry, I forgot to say, it is the only one I’ve found which has the new Prayer for the Jews actually in the text and not as an errata sheet.
Is it therefore not the case that re-prints of pre-1962 Missals might be less helpful, (for liturgical as opposed to study / private devotion purposes) than the Angelus and Baronius Missals, which use the text of the 1962MR?
The only real differences are in the Holy Week rites, and even then a reprint might have redeeming qualities that the two newer Missals don’t have.
The problem with modern reprint missals is they try to do too much. They seem to want to be more than what they are–a missal.
The older missals from the 1950s that i have are much easier to actually use at Mass. You don’t need to sift through a bunch of various prayers that you’d never actually use at a Mass.