A Roman Missal. Credit: Mazur
Posted on 11/28/2011 7:25:42 AM PST by NYer
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After the switch to a new Mass translation, old liturgical books should be respectfully buried, either intact or after being burned, according to the U.S. bishops.
“Whether or not the Sacramentary has been blessed by an official rite, it is appropriate to treat it with care,” the bishops' Secretariat for Divine Worship said in a recent response to several queries from U.S. Catholics. “Its disposal should be handled with respect.”
The bishops' liturgy office recommends “burying the Sacramentary in an appropriate location on church grounds, or perhaps in a parish cemetery,” after the switch to a new liturgical translation on Nov. 27.
“Some have even suggested following a custom used in various Eastern churches,” they noted, “whereby liturgical books or Bibles are placed in the coffin of the deceased as a sign of devotion and love for the liturgy.”
Some Catholics may be surprised to learn that it is appropriate – and even customary – to burn or bury old liturgical books and other religious items.
According to the U.S. bishops' secretariat, the ashes of liturgical books should be collected and “placed in the ground in an appropriate location on church grounds.”
Catholic tradition offers these means of disposal in order to ensure that objects used in worship are not casually discarded or mistreated, even when they are no longer needed for use or reference.
The liturgy office advised parishes to keep a copy of the old liturgical translations in their archives or libraries, after the switch to the Third Edition of the Roman Missal.
Hymnals and hand missals are also among the types of items that would traditionally be blessed, and should therefore be replaced respectfully after the changeover.
But the secretariat acknowledged it “might be difficult to appropriately dispose of a large number of copies of such books.”
If burning and burial are impractical, non-archived hymnals and hand missals “could be stored for use by prayer or study groups in the parish, offered to parishioners for their own private devotional use, or donated to other small communities that could effectively make use of them.”
The secretariat also noted that the new liturgical books ought to be blessed, using the rite provided in the Church's official “Book of Blessings,” before their first use on 2011's first Sunday of Advent – possibly at a weekday Mass the preceding Saturday, or outside Mass at a separate parish gathering.
And incensed, wouldn't you agree?
I have no idea what you’re supposed to do with these things but there are some hymnals I’d like to cremate. ;0) I promise I’ll go read this article now. The title caught my attention and this was my first thought. Sorry!
I DEFINITELY agree.
;-)))
Seconded here in the peanut gallery. ;)
As a sister explained it to us in my childhood, it is to protect the ignorant or weak or those tempted by evil from committing sacrilege with sacred objects. In other words, it’s to protect people, not objects. Every once in a while, a ray of light shines through the mist.
A few weeks ago we had a class to prepare for the new translation. Father had on a table the new sacramentary, the old translation sacramentary and the original Latin sacramentary from our parish’s founding in 1940. Pretty cool.
I believe it’s the new, revised Novus Ordo ‘mass books’ that should be burned. They are anathema to the true and historical Roman Catholic Church and its liturgy that was endorsed until the Second Coming of Jesus Christ by Pope Pius X (et al) up to the modernists’ Vatican II.
Did that pronouncement by Pope Pius X mean anything at all to the popes who followed Pius XII? Did the congregants who comprised Vatican II actually know what they were doing?
In some cases, some cardinals knew what the evil plan was: to, in the name of satan, destroy Christ’s Church on earth.
Or also use them to be teaching tools in regards to the history of the Catholic mass.
Wow, you were shown HISTORY in that class as well.
I view your comment about the three translations like my life. The first book, of my early life, which I barely, barely remember the old Latin mass, the second, what was for most of my life up until this past weekend, and now third, for what I hope will be for the rest of my life.
PS: Correction, what I should have said, what was used in my parish for the last time, at the Thanksgiving Day mass, the second book.
What was wonderful about the new books is that the art style shows a much more traditional style.
Destroy the evidence?
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