Posted on 12/15/2006 10:50:49 AM PST by monkapotamus
I recall reading that much of the Mass was sung in the early Middle Ages, including the Canon.
I'm Eastern rite, but I also revere the classical Roman rite due to its affinity with the Eastern rites. I can tell you hearing the mysteries of the faith, contained in the liturgy, sung in English every Sunday is very edifying to me.
Much of the Old rite could be traceable to the time of St. Gregory the Great, such as the Canon and structure of the Mass. The Paul VI ordo calendar suppressed many of the ancient parts of the Roman rite.
I would favor a reform or the reform that goes back to basics and jettison's the damage that Dom Gregory Dix's scholarship had on the Mass.
Latin, my friend, is only the official language of the Latin Church.
We Eastern Catholics have never used Latin and never will. Why not make Catholic children learn Byzantine Greek, Church Slavonic, Syriac, Ge'ez,etc.? (tongue-in-cheek)
Obviously we are talking about the Roman Catholic Latin Rite here...no offense meant to the other Rites which have probably weathered the post consiliar age better.
I was kidding with my response.
Latin is very useful outside the church as well. Its strict rules of grammar help students learn English better, not to mention that it enlarges their vocabulary.
Now yes, I wish my Greek were more solid -- I think it is easier to learn Greek once you have learned Latin though.
Another interesting thought someone gave as a possible reason for the Pope wanting to "regularize" the Tridentine Rite (for want of a better term!!): the Pope wants very much to improve relations with the Orthodox Churches, and heal the divide which seperates them. One could say, with some legitimacy, that the Orthodox Churches would have more difficulty seeing the Pope as being sincere when he continues to allow the supression of the older, more orthodox rite within the the Latin Church itself. In other words - heal thyself, and then get back with us!!
Hence, Benedict may have several rather complex reasons for wanting to address the situation with the Tridentine Rite, and getting the SSPX back into the fold may be only one of them.
I agree - there are a host of other aspects to this, some of them actually more important than the SSPX. Personally, I think the SSPX is not going to be happy, in the long run, because they have been used to doing things their own way for quite some time, cultivating their version of the Old Mass (which, the one time I saw them celebrate it, was dead silent, except for the occasional burst of rapid whispering). Probably when the Old Rite is restored or "regularized," there will be standards and guidelines for its celebration, and the SSPX may not like this.
Absolutely. The Novus Ordo cut the liturgical ties with the time when the East and the West were united.
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Viva Il Papa! He's brilliant.
When I read the headline and your response, I was irresistibly reminded of a Bible verse, the last verse of this passage from the last chapter of Revelation:
16 I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.
17 And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.
18 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book:
19 And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.
20 He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
Holy Batman!!!!!!!!! Famous intellectuals in Europe are issuing "manifestos!" Check the Italian, French and Latin versions as well.
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2006/12/italian-intellectuals-sign-tridentine.html
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2006/12/french-intellectuals-sign-tridentine.html
Saturday, December 16, 2006
Italian intellectuals sign "Tridentine Manifesto"
The Italian daily Il Foglio publishes today a manifesto signed by great Italian intellectuals, including Antonio Socci and Franco Zeffirelli (and also René Girard, of the Académie Française, who published with other French intellectuals a manifesto published today at Le Figaro), in defense of the liberation of the Traditional Roman Mass, the Missa Piana, and remembering the Petition of 1966 and the great British Petition of 1971, of venerable memory.
Our English version of the "Socci Manifesto" (from the Italian original):
I wish to launch an appeal to the world of culture.
In support of a decision of Benedict XVI.
The announcement was given by Cardinal Arturo Medina Estevez, a member of the Ecclesia Dei commission which met to discuss the liberalization of the Latin Mass. The prelate said, "The publication of the Motu Proprio by the Pope which will liberalize the celebration of the Latin Mass according to the Missal of Saint Pius V is close." It is an extraordinarily important event for the Church and even for the culture and history of our civilization. Historically, lay intellectuals were actually those to realize more and better the disaster, the actual cultural destruction, represented by the "prohibition" of the liturgy of Saint Pius V and the disappearance of Latin as sacred language of the Catholic Church.
When, 40 years ago -- in contravention to the documents of the Council -- the prohibition of the ancient liturgy of the Church (that which had been celebrated even during the Council) was imposed, there was a great and meritorious protest by very important intellectuals who considered this decision as an attack on the roots of our Christian Civilization (the liturgy has always been a center and a fountain of the most sublime art). Two appeals were published in defense of the Mass of Saint Pius V, in 1966 and 1971. These are some of the names which undersigned them: Jorge Luís Borges, Giorgio De Chirico, Elena Croce, W. H. Auden, the directors Bresson and Dreyer, Augusto Del Noce, Julien Green, Jacques Maritain (who indeed was the favorite intellectual of Paul VI, the one to whom the Pope had given the letter to intellectuals at the end of the Council), Eugenio Montale, Cristina Campo, François Mauriac, Salvatore Quasimodo, Evelyn Waugh, Maria Zambrano, Elémire Zolla, Gabriel Marcel, Salvador De Madariaga, Gianfranco Contini, Giacomo Devoto, Giovanni Macchia, Massimo Pallottino, Ettore Paratore, Giorgio Bassani, Mario Luzi, Guido Piovene, Andrés Segovia, Harold Acton, Agatha Christie, Graham Greene, and many others, incuding the editor of the “Times”, William Rees-Mogg.
They are largely lay intellectuals because the cultural and spiritual value of the ancient Latin liturgy is a legacy of all, as is the Sistine Chapel, as is the Gregorian [chant], as the great cathedrals, Gothic sculpture, the Basilica of Saint Peter also are. Even more so today, when our entire European Civilization risks to cut off and deny its own roots.
Curiously, even "progressive Catholics", which made the dialogue with the world and with modern culture their banner, did not give any regard and fought for forty years to keep this incredible prohibition. An unprecedented arbitrariness. In April 2005, at the eve of the election of Benedict XVI, it was a lay writer, Guido Ceronetti, who writes, in La Repubblica, an open letter to the new Pope, in which he asked "that the sinister suffocating gag on the Latin voice of the Mass be removed". When he was a cardinal, Ratzinger declared that the prohibition of the Mass of Saint Pius V was unprecedented: "throughout her history, has never abolished nor forbidden orthodox liturgical forms, which would be quite alien to the very spirit of the Church". In one of his books, he retold dramatically how he had viewed the publication of the missal of Paul VI: "I was dismayed by the prohibition of the old missal, since nothing of the sort had ever happened in the entire history of the liturgy. The impression was even given that what was happening was quite normal," but, Ratzinger wrote, "the prohibition of the missal that was now decreed, a missal that had known continuous growth over the centuries, starting with the sacramentaries of the ancient Church, introduced a breach into the history of the liturgy whose consequences could only be tragic ... the old building was demolished, and another was built."
The effects were disastrous. The road to incredible abuses in the liturgy was opened. Ratzinger writes, "I am convinced that the crisis in the Church that we are experiencing today is to a large extent due to the disintegration of the liturgy, which at times has even come to be conceived of etsi Deus non daretur: in that it is a matter of indifference whether or not God exists and whether or not He speaks to us and hears us. But when the community of faith, the world-wide unity of the Church and her history, and the mystery of the living Christ are no longer visible in the liturgy, where else, then, is the Church to become visible in her spiritual essence?"
That same Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, who prepares to cancel the prohibition, will find opposition even inside the Church (already pre-announced by the French bishops) and he deserves an answer from the world of culture which, forty years ago, made its voice heard. I ask intellectuals and whomever may wish to do so to sign this synthetc manifesto:
"We express our praise for the decision of Benedict XVI to cancel the prohibition of the ancient Mass in Latin according to the Missal of Saint Pius V, a great legacy of our culture, which must be saved and rediscovered."
Frank
Ping!!!!!!!
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2006/12/italian-intellectuals-sign-tridentine.html
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2006/12/french-intellectuals-sign-tridentine.html
Yes, quite a list. I don't see Tolkien's name on it, and maybe he was too modest to sign, but he would have agreed, too.
ping for later
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2006/12/letter-of-tridentine-support-in-le-figaro/#comments
Fr. Zuhlsdorf has now picked up the story on the various letters.
There is a LOT of resistance from First World Bishops.
I think requiring Old Slavonic would be a good thing.
You first.
So it seems. I was startled to see the "intellectual elite" of a group of countries step forward to point out the obvious--that a great liturgical gem has been locked away unseen or unused for 40 years.
Slava Isusu Christu!
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