40 years of Missale Romanum and the new Roman Rite
Forty years ago today, the First Sunday of Advent, one of the weakest Popes in Church history, Paul VI, mandated the Novus Ordo Missae (New Order of Mass) in the Roman Rite. After almost 1,500 years of the Traditional Latin Mass, the same Mass that had conquered entire continents for Christ and had lifted thousands of men and women to the altar as saints, Pope Paul saddled us with this.
What was the reaction of the Roman Catholic world, who had never asked for a change in their Mass in the first place? Millions left the Church, vocations hit rock bottom, and belief in almost every Catholic doctrine, most especially the Eucharist, hit (and remains at) an all time low. Well done!
There are many (especially amongst my friends) who will defend the novelty of the New Mass to the day they die. I, on the other hand, look at the destruction it left in its wake, and wonder….how did we ever allow this to happen?
Martin Luther, wherever he may be, is still laughing.
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40 years of Missale Romanum and the new Roman Rite - II: a Requiem, by Paul VI
On the First Sunday of Advent (November 30), 1969, the New Missal entered into force officially (it would take a few years before it was to be completely phased in worldwide).
In his words in the General Audience which immediately preceded that date, Pope Paul VI was clear:
We may notice that pious persons will be the ones most disturbed, because, having their respectable way of listening to Mass, they will feel distracted from their customary thoughts and forced to follow those of others.
...
Not Latin, but the spoken language, will be the main language of the Mass. To those who know the beauty, the power, the expressive sacrality of Latin, its replacement by the vulgar language is a great sacrifice: we lose the discourse of the Christian centuries, we become almost intruders and desecrators [intrusi e profani] in the literary space of sacred expression, and we will thus lose a great portion of that stupendous and incomparable artistic and spiritual fact that is the Gregorian Chant. We will thus have, indeed, reason for being sad, and almost for feeling lost: with what will we replace this angelic language? It is a sacrifice of inestimable price.
What was the reaction of the Roman Catholic world, who had never asked for a change in their Mass in the first place? Millions left the Church, vocations hit rock bottom, and belief in almost every Catholic doctrine, most especially the Eucharist, hit (and remains at) an all time low. Well done!
There are many (especially amongst my friends) who will defend the novelty of the New Mass to the day they die. I, on the other hand, look at the destruction it left in its wake, and wonder….how did we ever allow this to happen?
Martin Luther, wherever he may be, is still laughing.
_________________________________________________________________
40 years of Missale Romanum and the new Roman Rite - II: a Requiem, by Paul VI
On the First Sunday of Advent (November 30), 1969, the New Missal entered into force officially (it would take a few years before it was to be completely phased in worldwide).
In his words in the General Audience which immediately preceded that date, Pope Paul VI was clear:
We may notice that pious persons will be the ones most disturbed, because, having their respectable way of listening to Mass, they will feel distracted from their customary thoughts and forced to follow those of others.
...
Not Latin, but the spoken language, will be the main language of the Mass. To those who know the beauty, the power, the expressive sacrality of Latin, its replacement by the vulgar language is a great sacrifice: we lose the discourse of the Christian centuries, we become almost intruders and desecrators [intrusi e profani] in the literary space of sacred expression, and we will thus lose a great portion of that stupendous and incomparable artistic and spiritual fact that is the Gregorian Chant. We will thus have, indeed, reason for being sad, and almost for feeling lost: with what will we replace this angelic language? It is a sacrifice of inestimable price.
posted by PreVat2 at
10:19 AM
8 Comments:
1. Our Assistant Priest told us during Sunday mass that none of us will like the changes, but we must obey our bishops. And we did, unfortunately instead of burning their chanceries down around their very ears! Now if Pope Benedict suddently dumped the N.O.M., there will be riots in the pews because "obedience" is a foreign concept nowadays.
2. Mass now (exclusively) in a spoken language. This is massive obedience to the dictates of Vatican II, not that I am a fan of this tragic Council in the first place. Sacrosanctum Concilium states that Latin MUST be retained in the liturgy. And the Council of Trent stated that mass must not be celebrated ONLY in the vernacular.
Two major dogmatic constitutions of two major General Councils, one of them being a dogmatic council and the other a . . . hmmmmh . . . an inanity IMHO.
Thanks for nothing, Rembert Weakland, a member of the Consilium who designed and saddled us with the modern liturgy.
Two major dogmatic constitutions of two major General Councils, one of them being a dogmatic council and the other a . . . hmmmmh . . . an inanity IMHO.
I left something out of the above statement. I meant to say these two Councils and their pertinent documents dealt explicitly with Latin in the liturgy and are being disobeyed today!
Wonderful post, too bad it is just us "traditionalists" that feel that way. If the Bishops would give it a chance, and expose their diocese to more Latin Masses, and Liturgy, they may find that it is what Good Catholics want. But why listen to the people, as Obuma and Pewlousy would question, how would they know what is good for them?
In Archbishop Piero Marini's new book, he explains how the Concilium's goal in drafting the 1969 Roman Missal was not to just change the manner in which Catholic's worship, but to change what Catholic's believe. The Concilium understood that maxim, lex orandi, lex credendi. The law of prayer is the law of belief. If you changed how Catholics prayed the Mass, then Catholics would more willingly adopt the changes in Church doctrine which the ideologues on the Concilium were advocating. To evidence the success the implementation of 1969 Roman Missal has had in this regard, all one needs to do is conduct a poll of lay Catholics at your average Novus Ordo parish on their opinions about historically unquestioned Truths such as Transubstantiation, Incarnation, the effects, causes, or existence of mortal sin, the sacraments, etc.
Paul VI was of course not a part of this treachery. I believe he was honestly attempting to do something he thought necessary to position the Church such that it could more easily contend/combat the infiltration of the Modern world. Or, conversely, better position the Church to influence the World in a more positive direction from where it was heading back in 1969. Sadly, Paul VI apparently just entrusted the job to the worst people imagineable.
When I read or listen to Paul VI's words, it seems to me that he was not 100% sure that what he was doing was the right thing. There seems to be quite a bit of trepidation in his words. And it is interesting that in his own words, he admits things that to this day I have never heard a neo-con or "reform of the reform" type admit. That being that the 1969 Roman Missal was indeed an innovation and was indeed something new and novel. Paul VI openly acknowledged the full weight and drastic character of the change. He does not pretend, as so many well intentioned Catholics today seem to do, that the 1969 Missal was something other than what it was. A drastic break with liturgical tradition. He explained, however, that this action was necessary for the Church to thrive.
I wonder what he would say about his decision today after having forty years of hindsight to assess the spiritual carnage?
I recall that it took a good five years for the "vernacular Mass" to get to the mission churches in AK. Let's pray it doesn't take that long for the TLM to return to those churches, and the rest of the NO "mission" churches.
Yet, with the reform, what do we find but that the dissident and non-believer are out in the open. It remains my view (always open to improvement) that this is what the whole deal is about ... ie, to expose the enemy.
This is massive obedience to the dictates of Vatican II,
Again I messed up. WRT the vernacular only liturgy, this is massive DISobedience . . . .
Re: Apb. Marini's book: To change the theology of the CC is to say that the Church is NOT indefectible. If the Church is defectible, then the Magisterium is not infallible. The CC, then, is a false church. Thanks Marini . . . where did you get your theology or divinity degree? Some diploma mill in Pomona, CA perhaps?
Great point, Adeodatus49!!!
Reminds me of when I lived in DC for a couple years, and explored the library at Catholic University of America ... and lit upon the section in the stacks where the doctoral dissertations of the various bishops were located.
I glanced through that of Cdl Mahony, and a few others before getting bored ... and wondering why there was not much to those doctoral documents.
I've done a fair amount of reading and can pretty much see what level something is on, even if it's over my head.
If those dissertations are still accessible in the open stacks, someone ought to examine them and see what they come up with ... say, for instance, who were the persons who signed off on them, and especially jot down some example passages from them.
I cannot find the expression to show how droll those less than par pieces looked.
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