Aug 25, 2009

Do YOU Want Mass in Latin?

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It's amazing how people jump to conclusions regarding conferences that offer suggestions to the Pope. This is from today's National Catholic Reporter.



VATICAN CITY -- A Vatican spokesman downplayed a report that major liturgical reforms are being considered by Pope Benedict XVI.
"At the moment, there are no institutional proposals for a modification of the liturgical books currently in use," the spokesman, Father Ciro Benedettini, said Aug. 24.
He was responding to a report that a document with proposed liturgical modifications, including a curb on the practice of receiving Communion in the hand, had been sent to the pope last April by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments.
The article, published by the newspaper Il Giornale, said the document was a first concrete step toward the "reform of the reform" in liturgy planned by Pope Benedict. It said the congregation proposed to promote a greater sense of the sacred in liturgy, recover the use of the Latin language in celebrations, and reformulate introductive parts of the Roman Missal to end abuses and experimentation.
The article said the worship congregation had voted on and approved the recommendations almost unanimously during its plenary session last March.
Vatican sources told Catholic News Service that the worship congregation did not, in fact, suggest a program of liturgical change, but simply forwarded to the pope some considerations from its discussions focusing on eucharistic adoration, the theme of the plenary session.
Some individual members may have added opinions on other liturgical issues, but they in no way constituted formal proposals, one source said.



Read the rest here. I wonder why people love stirring this pot? I'd like to take a poll of the 150 or so of you who regularly view these pages here. How many here would like Mass to be in Latin? How many want the priest to face away from the people during mass? How many people want to not have the option of receiving the Eucharist in their hands?

OK those are three easy questions. Click Here to take survey

Now let's ask three more:

How many here wish their Sunday preaching was more interesting and engaging? How many here wish that music in their church was actually singable? How many wish that people were actually engaged in parish life and that it became more than a place to go to mass for one hour each week?

Click Here to take survey

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The devil is in the details. I don't want the priest to face away from the people in the mass, I would like to face the same direction as the priest, and be lead by the priest in prayer during the Liturgy of the Eucharist.

And while I am a big fan of using the vernacular in the liturgy, I would still like to see greater use of Latin, especially in the standard parts.

I would like to see the option of Communing on the tongue or in the hand persist, but I would also like to ditch the ATM line for a return to the altar rail approach .. even if there is no altar rail and whether or not people kneel.

On the one hand, I think the wider use of the Pian Missal / Extraordinary Form could improve the richness of the liturgical life of the wider Church. But on the other hand, I think the ghetto-ification of the the more traditionally minded in the Church has deprived the wider Church of some of the liturgical reformational zeal that the Church needs.


And while I think any increase in piety and devotion in the liturgy will improve the preaching, music and life of the parish, I don't think it will solve those problems on its own.

Anonymous said...

Every time this discussion comes up I feel vaguely sick.

I don't quite get the nostalgia. Maybe because I was born in 1964 and don't really remember the Latin Mass.

All I remember from my childhood is, "Carry in the Lysol. Kristi's got the Lysol. Carry in the Lysol."

Oh yeah, there's also, "My father can beat your father in dominoes."

Yes. Latin really makes Mass interesting and engaging.

Thankfully, the altar of our parish is in the center of the sanctuary and all the seats surround it. The altar is square. It matters not a whit where the priest chooses to stand.

Fran said...

I am very fortunate in that I worship in one parish and work in another(and I try to get there once a month for Sunday mass to support my boss and be present for that community)and both places have excellent, well attended liturgies.

Good music, singing, excellent liturgical practices - all very vibrant and good.

As for the Latin, I am old enough to remember being in the second grade and sitting in the same pew with my CCD classmates on Sunday morning. I held my little missalette with the English words in certain places. I also remember thinking Et cum spirit tu tuo sounded like a phone number.

That said, I do think, as badsede suggests, some use of Latin. At my wedding we used the Kyrie and we also used the Agnus Dei. I think that those are nice and carry forth the golden thread if you will.

Probably my biggest issue with the Tridentine Rite is that it seems so much less communal. The focus, the source and summit is Eucharist, but we are many members of that one Body and I prefer a rite that reflects that.

Aristotle A. Esguerra said...

Lurker alert — found you on a Google Search RSS feed, so feel free to ignore.

How about a through-sung Mass regardless of form (Ordinary/Extraordinary), language (Latin/English/Spanish, etc.), or rite (Roman, Ambrosian, Syro-Malankara, etc.)?

That is in fact what the Church has been asking for almost a century. I could prooftext primary sources (and in fact have done so), but that's tiresome for giver and recipient alike.

Here's an example of a through-sung Mass in English according to the current translation. It was celebrated facing the people. People didn't know how to sing the Confiteor, but got through it all the same (and without a cantor or song leader).

Singing is a lover's thing, says Augustine. So why do we too often mutter "And also with you" at the Wedding Feast of the Lamb?

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