In this PODCAzT I read for you the Latin version of the extract from the traditional Rituale Romanum of A Prayer In Times of Epidemics (RR Tit. IX. Ch. X).
It really should be done in Latin.
These devotions and the use of Latin slipped away. I can’t help but think that this was systematically and purposely stripped out of the church’s life to weaken our Catholic identity and to make us more susceptible to the winds of the world with its shifting fads and mores. It won’t be easy to recover ourselves and our sense of ourselves. That’s why I try to help by reading the Latin of some of these rites, such as traditional baptism or exorcism and blessings of holy water and the like. If you need help with something, Fathers, let me know.
Meanwhile, let’s beat this damned virus down into the dust with self-discipline and mighty prayers.
We hear some music by Giovanni Gabrieli, Music For San Rocco. San Rocco is a great patron of the sick and an intercessor in time of plague. And, for music, there’s a surprise at the end.
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Father Z, you are doing great work during these times. Thank you.
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Me, to my husband, “Fr. Z….he does a lot.”
Husband: “mmm…good man.”
We enjoyed hearing this prayer and the information. Thank you. Please stay well.
Thank you so much for pasting those invaluable resources, Father!
However, QUÆRITUR: May I, as a seminarian use this prayer (except for the Dominus Vobiscum and Blessing)?
We are allowed here to use the Book of (non-)Blessings, but the effect differs widely and wildly. And how about this and the other parts of the Rituale Romanum?
Thank you, again! Please, pray for us. You’re always on our prayers.
[Omitting the priestly bits, yes, I think you can pray this.]
“Meanwhile, let’s beat this damned virus down into the dust with self-discipline and mighty prayers.”
And let us not forget the Holy Hand Grenade:
https://youtu.be/xOrgLj9lOwk
The Chicken
As for the mighty prayers: You know, if you are on a long pilgrimage on foot (read N.-D. de Chrétienté), you might sing songs about our Lord’s Head full of Blood and Wounds, and so on, when your spirits are up.
When your spirits are down, you’ll sing, at least if you are a German, a song that goes like this (I am actually not making this up):
We were anchored ‘fore Madagascar
and having the plague aboard.
In the cauldrons, the water was rotting,
and daily, a man went overboard.
Ahoy! my dear comrades!
ahoy! ahoy!
Farewell, oh my li’ll lass,
farewell, farewell!
Yea when the shipper’s piano sounds aboard,
the sailors all silent will be, (-lent will be!) [*]
for then all recall where they live a-at home
which they’d so much love just once again to see.
[* The translation here includes, by mere accident, a nice wordplay not in the original.]
So, my spirits are down, and that’s what I’m going to sing. Not quite mightily a prayer, but if it allows me to march on, I’ll thank it in all humility.
“… and the use of Latin slipped away. I can’t help but think that this was systematically and purposely stripped out of the church’s life to weaken our Catholic identity …” I wholeheartedly agree with this. On a related note, all sorts of excuses are offered up for the near-death of Latin in public schools. I have long believed that the abandonment of Latin by the Church — even the forgoing of Latin instruction in Catholic schools — played a great part in its falling into disfavor in public schools. Fortunately, Latin is considered a central part of the classical curriculum in homeschooling.
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