Liturgy

In a highly anticipated move Monsignor Guido Marini will replace Archbishop Piero Marini as the pope’s Master of Ceremonies.

John Allen Jr. in an informative posts titled Vatican’s top liturgical liberal steps down describes the history of Piero Marini’s performance of Master of Ceremonies since 1987. Now I won’t pig pile (too much) on Piero Marini tour as MC, but it will be nice to see one excuse go down the drain when people use papal Masses as an excuse for their own experimentation and especially liturgical dance. A change has long been predicted ever since Pope Benedict became pope, but you got to wonder if the change had anything to do with those multicolor vestments used in Loretto?

Creative Minority Report has a wonderful letter from Bishop William Murphy of Rockville Centre to his pastor Father Coschignano about moving the Blessed Sacrament back to the main body of the Church. The letter manages with no finger pointing to point our some some problems the Bishop witnessed in comportment of those receiving the Eucharist. Besides having the Tabernacle moved the Bishop also requested that catechesis on the reverence due to the Blessed Sacrament also be given.

As they say – read the whole thing.

Fr. Z also has a nice anti-fisk on this letter.

I always find it confusing when the Blessed Sacrament is reserved in an area way off the main axis of the Church. With the Tabernacle not easily within line of site do you just make a profound bow to the altar or do you turn at an angle to where the Blessed Sacrament is reserved and genuflect? Usually I go for the angle genuflection, but it makes me feel like an artiliary officer and that I need to call in to verify I have the right angle and I wish I had a laser spotter.

I have observed that most people don’t have this problem since they neigher genuflect or make a profound (or even non-profound) bow as they enter in churches designed this way.

After coming across this at Dad29 who was quoting from a new blog called Fatherless Catholic I though it must be a parody. If what this blogger reports is accurate, then his pastors comments are quite stunning.

Discussions with our new �pastor� about the new liturgical practices that violate Redemptionis Sacramentum include such �pastoral� comments as:

�I will not celebrate the Liturgy in a way that makes ME uncomfortable.� (This is in reference to calling God �Father� and praying the Eucharistic Prayers as written.)

�Your previous Pastors (who celebrated the Mass according to the GIRM and Redemptionis Sacramentum) did the parish no favors and poorly formed the parish when it comes to Liturgical practice.�

�The Archbishop has not fully implemented the GIRM and Redemptionis Sacramentum in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee.�

�I am not sticking my neck out here as there are parishes in other parts of the Archdiocese that celebrate the Mass in a more liberal way than I do and are not required to change.�

When telling �Father� that his actions are dividing the parish his comment is: �Maybe that needs to happen.� So much for being concerned about the church community.

And my person favorite: �If I have a choice between listening to you (Fatherless Catholic) and listening to Bishop Sklba, I will listen to Bishop Sklba.�
Hmmmmmm. I guess Archbishop Dolan does not matter in this.

I have seen more and more of the excuse that the bishop has not fully implemented GIRM and Redemptionis Sacramentum in a diocese. Maybe I am missing something in liturgical law, but I didn’t realize that the Bishop had to hand-hold pastors in reading and them simply implementing Church documents. Most of what is mentioned in Redemptionis Sacramentum are proscriptions and are basically "stop doing these." The only implementation is to stop doing those abuses. What exactly needs to be implement about not consecrating the Precious Blood in the glass cruet and after consecration not pouring the Precious Blood into chalices? The bishop can not give a dispensation for this (despite what Cardinal Mahony says). The implementation excuse was also used when the dispensation for EMHC to purify the sacred vessels expired and the Pope formerly rescinded the previous dispensation for the United States.

Dad29 has some comments on this also and I agree with his diagnosis "He must have missed the last 20 years of "I Gotta Be MEEEEEE!!!"

PORTSMOUTH � Due to a decree this past summer by Pope Benedict XVI, Latin Masses may now be performed if a group of parishioners within a particular church requests it. Before the decree, permission from the local bishop had to be obtained before a Latin Mass could be performed in his diocese.

Michael Kerper, pastor of Immaculate Conception in Portsmouth, celebrated the Latin Mass at the church on Sunday according to the 1962 Roman Missal. The 1962 Missal is the standard low Mass in Latin that was sanctioned by Pope John Paul in 1962, and it became a common template for traditional Latin Masses.

It was the first time in 40 years that the traditional Latin Mass has been offered anywhere on the New Hampshire Seacoast. Approximately 400 parishioners attended, about half of the church’s communicant capacity.

“Father Kerper did a wonderful job,” parishioner Bill St. Laurent said. “It went beautifully. He had never done a traditional Mass in Latin, but he purchased a copy of the 1962 Roman Missal and worked hard for six or seven weeks learning the Latin.”

St. Laurent is president of the New Hampshire chapter of Una Voce, an international federation of associations that have been seeking to reinstate Latin Masses across the world.

Anita Seedner of York, Maine, who attends St. Christopher Parish in York, said people have “lost a sense of what it means to be a Catholic,” because the prayers were “watered down” when they were translated from Latin to English.

Still others believe that the incorporation of Latin Masses could create a sense of “us and them” � those who believe the traditional Mass to be more deeply rooted in the traditions of the Catholic Church, and those who believe that understanding the meaning of the words is essential to the Mass experience.

For supporters of the Latin Mass, it comes down to choice.
“The Latin Mass isn’t replacing the English Mass; it is just giving people an option,” St. Laurent said.

One of the better articles I have seen on the extraordinary form of Mass. Though I had to laugh at the term "communicant capacity" to describe seating capacity in the church. Though I think there is such thing as communicant capacity in that the Eucharist gives grace depending upon the capacity of the communicant.

Godzdogz has some great pictures of the clothing of novices in Cambridge.

There have been several of these films celebrating Summorum Pontificum by contrasting clown Masses and other such nonsense with the extraordinary form of the Mass.

While on one level I enjoy the humor of these films there is another level that bothers me. For one I think it is a problem to compare the ordinary and extraordinary forms of the Mass in the Latin rite by taking the worse example and excesses and then to compare them to the Masses celebrated properly in the older form. You don’t see examples of the ordinary form being celebrated properly and reverentially as you would for example see on EWTN or in my own parish. There are "Novus Ordo" Masses being celebrated according the the rubrics and in a way that turly helps you to worship God. I am not all that tearful, but I can certainly testify to having tears form while participating at Mass at my parish. Though I must admit the Mass celebrated at other parishes at times could invoke tears, but not for joy.

I am all for critiquing experimental Masses that depart from the GIRM into a world of someone else’s creation where entertainment becomes the prime purpose. The so called do-it-yourself Mass is of course a problem. I just don’t think we should pit one valid form of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass with another valid form of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. We don’t see video’s pitting an Eastern rite Mass against the so-called Tridentine form of the Mass, even though the Eastern rites are really quite beautiful and transcendent and really kick smells and bells up a notch.

There seems to be this idea out there if the 1970 Missal of Paul VI was never promulgated that we would have escaped all the conscience that has occurred. Man with black hat had a good post previously on the People’s Mass Book issued in 1964 where we can see the experimental tendency being used with the 1962 missal. That somehow people who don’t even stick with the reduced rubrics of the 1970 missal would have stuck with the 1962 one. Possibly some of the worst excesses might have been avoided if the missal had not been promulgated during this tumultuous time. I just think the idea that we wouldn’t have had clown masses using the 1962 missal to be naive.

Now I am all for the reform of the reform and I am hopeful that Summorum Pontificum is a movement along this path. New translations coming within the next couple of years are also going to be quite helpful along this path.

People complain about abuses precisely because they are abuses – they depart from the missal. I just think it sets up a false dichotomy to make a comparison between ordinary form of the Mass celebrated improperly and irreverently with the extraordinary form of the mass celebrated correctly. These attitudes against the ordinary form of the Mass are common among schismatics and sedevacanist and I wish they were less common among those who don’t fall into these groups. Lets have both forms of the Mass in the Latin rite celebrated properly and work to those ends.

As I end this post I am watching the start of the Solemn High Mass: Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite on EWTN.

Baronius Press announces the publication of a new edition of The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, from the Breviary of the Extraordinary Latin Liturgy, as permitted by Summorum Pontificum.

“The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary has been a corner stone of Catholic devotion, for both priests and lay people, throughout the centuries. We hope that by publishing this new edition, people today will discover the fruits of these beautiful prayers to the Mother of God” notes Dr. John Newton, Editor of Baronius Press.

Of particular note is the inclusion of the complete Gregorian chant for the Office in this book. The music for the Little Office has never before been gathered together in one volume.

Fr. Berg, Superior of the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter warmly welcomed this new publication: “Devotion to Our Lady is part of the spiritual life of the Church, and fulfils her words that all generations will call her blessed (Luke i.48). The Little Office will help the Faithful to pray with even greater devotion to Our Blessed Lady. ”

This publication is published in cooperation with the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, A Society of Apostolic Life of Pontifical Right founded with the approval of His Holiness Pope John Paul II in 1988, for the formation and sanctification of priests in the framework of the TRADITIONAL LITURGY of the ROMAN RITE and their pastoral deployment in the service of the Church.

The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary is a shorter version of the Liturgy of the Hours, but follows the same format as the Morning and Evening Prayers found in the Breviary. I started with the The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary in my own prayer life before I moved on to the four volume set of the Liturgy of the Hours. Though the little office is more than just the breviary on training wheels, but a devotional practice that will meet the needs of many.

Baronius Press besides the little office also has a ‘Summorum Pontificum’ edition of the Daily Missal 1962.

LONDON (CNS) — British musicians recorded the classic Irish hymn, "Sweet Heart of Jesus," in a calypso, disco style and sent it to Pope Benedict XVI on an iPod nano.

Pope Benedict might like it, or he might become the first pontiff in history to throw an iPod into the trash.

The musicians’ intention, however, was to soften the pope’s attitude toward modern church music.

The gift is from contemporary Catholic songwriters Jo Boyce and Mike Stanley, and it features a new album of classic hymns reworked in modern forms of music. The duo has used instruments such as pianos, saxophones, guitars, drums and synthesizers to recreate centuries-old works in laid-back gospel, folk, funk, soul and lounge-music styles.

The album, "Age to Age," was downloaded onto an iPod and sent to Pope Benedict in the hope of gaining a "papal seal of approval," said a Sept. 4 press release by the Catholic Communications Network of the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales.

The Pope already has an iPod Nano given him by Vatican Radio.

Though the white iPod nano is tiny, it still made an impression on the pope. When the head of the radio’s technical and computer support department, Mauro Milita, identified himself and handed the pope the boxed iPod, the pope was said to have replied, "Computer technology is the future."

The pope’s new 2-gigabyte digital audio player already was loaded with a sampling of the radio’s programming in English, Italian and German and musical compositions by Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Frederic Chopin, Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky and Igor Stravinsky. The stainless steel back was engraved with the words "To His Holiness, Benedict XVI" in Italian.

After his first iPod Nano loaded with classical music and getting his new one – after listening to it he might take it too the local Apple Store Genius Bar and complain that there is something wrong with it "The music sounds familiar but the sound has gone horribly wrong. Can you fix it?"

The sung Mass remains the normative form in the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church � but it is not the norm in most parishes. �A liturgical service takes on a nobler aspect when the rites are celebrated with singing,� says the Constitution on Sacred Liturgy (1964). Another church document refers to the sung or chanted Mass, saying �For the celebration of the Eucharist with the people, especially on Sundays and feast days, a form of sung Mass (Missa in cantu) is to be preferred as much as possible, even several times on the same day.� (Musicam Sacram, 1967). Chanting the Mass was once common in England, for example, before the Reformation and the reign of Henry VIII.

The Catholic Church reflects various traditions and customs, as well as various liturgies that have come down to believers over the ages. For example, the Byzantine rite of the Divine Liturgy, or Mass, is sung in plain chant by cantors who lead the congregations. While congregations of the Byzantine rite once used Church Slavonic exclusively, they now overwhelmingly use the vernacular. The Roman rite predominates in the United States and elsewhere in the Americas and, while it once used Latin for liturgies, it moved to using vernacular languages in the 1960s.

However, with the recent release of Pope Benedict XVI�s Motu Propio document that allows the option to priests of the Roman rite to celebrate the Tridentine ritual of the Mass in Latin (as was the case universally before the Second Vatican Council), some priests in the US are scrambling to learn and chant the rituals of the Mass in Latin. An example of the use of innovative teaching technology in this vein is found at Sancta Missa, a website sponsored by the Society of St. John Cantius and dedicated to web-based tutorials for priests interested in learning the Latin Mass.

A seminar to teach priests to chant the Latin Mass is to be offered October 17-19, 2007 by the Church Music Association of America in conjunction with St. John Cantius Catholic parish in Chicago IL. According to a press release issued by the Church Music Association, the goal of the seminar is to provide a full initiation into the method and manner of singing the Mass in the Roman Rite. The seminar covers: basics of common tones; pronunciation; singing the collects, readings, prefaces, and other parts of the Mass; musical rubrics for the Roman rite; integration of the celebrant, schola (choir), and people; literature and the wide range of options; vocal production and style.

It would be wonderful if more an more Masses were sung and I do hope the interest in chanting the Mass for the extraordinary form will translate into chanting the Mass in the ordinary form. I do love when they chant the Mass at my parish for the ordinary form of Mass whether in English or in Latin. A sung Mass seems to me to add to the transcendence of the Mass and to help me to pray with the Mass more.

Just when you think Chris Gillibrand can’t top the photo’s he finds of Masses in European churches he makes another find.

Now I know that the Church through Peter has the power to bind and loose, but this is ridiculous. At the end of Mass the priest announces "That’s a wrap."

My suspicion is that the liturgist (because one had to be involved ) who came up with this already had their brain pulled out through their nose with hooks. Now that might sound rather uncharitable, but I happen to think that is the charitable position.

Other pictures include the mummies unwrapping themselves. You just can’t find modest mummies no more.