Common of the Dedication of a Church

[Razanir]

Three questions.

1. Can you pray the Common of the day of a church’s actual dedication, even if it’s not a feria?
2. What about Vespers I?
3. Does any of this change if said day is not just a Sunday, but Divine Mercy Sunday?

 

[Gertabelle]

Unless you are a consecrated religious under a vow of obedience to pray the Divine Office – for private prayer you can pray the Liturgy of the Hours any way you want – it’s prayer, it’s the Word of God. Pray!

Now if you are trying to arrange, for example, a parish communal prayer of the Liturgy of the Hours, then you would probably need to stick with your diocesan calendar. There is a list of which feasts take precedence over others, which can never be bumped, which can be bumped to other days or completed ignored, etc., on the Table of Liturgical Days in the front of the Liturgy of the Hours books. And if you are doing something for the larger community, speak with your pastor first.

God bless you!

Gertie

 

[Razanir]

Unless you are a consecrated religious under a vow of obedience to pray the Divine Office – for private prayer you can pray the Liturgy of the Hours any way you want – it’s prayer, it’s the Word of God. Pray!

True, but I see no reason not to follow the rubrics anyway.

There is a list of which feasts take precedence over others, which can never be bumped, which can be bumped to other days or completed ignored, etc., on the Table of Liturgical Days in the front of the Liturgy of the Hours books.

Actually, I checked online. I haven’t seen in the Missal myself, but other people have quoted it, and it seems the dedication of a church supersedes literally anything else, except for the days which you can’t dedicate a church on. And apparently the Octave of Easter is not one of those exceptions.

I mostly just wanted to double check, because I hadn’t heard of anything superseding the Octave of Easter.

 

[Gertabelle]

This is the text of the link I provided in my first post:

**Table of Liturgical Days

I.**

1. Easter triduum of the Lord’s passion and resurrection.

1. Christmas, Epiphany, Ascension, and Pentecost.
   Sundays of Advent, Lent, and the Easter season.
   Ash Wednesday.
   Weekdays of Holy Week from Monday to Thursday inclusive.
   Days within the octave of Easter.

1. Solemnities of the Lord, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and saints listed in the General Calendar.
   All Souls.

1. Proper Solemnities, namely:
   a. Solemnity of the principal patron of the place, that is, the city or state.
   b. Solemnity of the dedication of a particular church and the anniversary.
   c. Solemnity of the title, or of the founder, or of the principal patron of a religious order or congregation.

II

1. Feasts of the Lord in the General Calendar.

1. Sundays of the Christmas season and Sundays in Ordinary Time.

1. Feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary and of the saints in the General Calendar.

1. Proper feasts, namely:
   a. Feast of the principal patron of the diocese.
   b. Feast of the anniversary of the dedication of the cathedral.
   c. Feast of the principal patron of a region or province, or a country, or of a wider territory.
   d. Feast of the title, founder, or principle patron of an order or congregation and of a religious province, without prejudice to the directives in no. 4.
   e. Other feasts proper to an individual church.
   f. Other feasts listed in the calendar of a diocese or of a religious order or congregation.
2. Weekdays of Advent from 17 December to 24 December inclusive.
   Days within the octave of Christmas.
   Weekdays of Lent.

III

1. Obligatory memorials in the General Calendar.

1. Proper obligatory memorials, namely:
   a. Memorial of a secondary patron of the place, diocese, region, or province, country or wider territory, or of an order or congregation and of a religious province.
   b. Obligatory memorials listed in the calendar of a diocese, or of an order or congregation.
2. Optional memorials; but these may be celebrated even on the days listed in no. 9, in the special manner described by the General Instruction of the Roman Missal and of the Liturgy of the Hours.
   In the same manner obligatory memorials may be celebrated as optional memorials if they happen to fall on the Lenten weekdays.

1. Weekdays of Advent up to 16 December inclusive.
   Weekdays of the Christmas season from 2 January until the Saturday after Epiphany.
   Weekdays of the Easter season from Monday after the octave of Easter until the Saturday before Pentecost inclusive.
   Weekdays in Ordinary Time.

According to above list, days in the Octave of Easter (I.2) take precedence over the dedication of a particular church (I.4).

Gertie

 

[OraLabora]

Unless you are a consecrated religious under a vow of obedience to pray the Divine Office – for private prayer you can pray the Liturgy of the Hours any way you want – it’s prayer, it’s the Word of God. Pray!

Then it ceases to be the “Liturgy” of the Hours. Liturgy has a specific meaning in that it is the universal public prayer of the entire Church. Laity are encouraged to pray, but are also encouraged to pray the “Liturgy” of the Hours, which means that for it to be liturgy, the rubrics in the approved books need to be followed, the calendar followed, etc.

If one is going to go through the trouble, I cannot imagine why one would not also want to have the benefit of praying the universal, public prayer of the Church while doing it.

That said, there are specific dedications that are on the General Roman Calendar so you follow the degree of solemnity prescribed in the calendar. But there are also local dedications: your parish and your cathedral, or for a religious community, your conventual chapel. These are celebrated as such:

-The dedication of the cathedral is celebrated as a solemnity in the Cathedral (thus with First Vespers) and a Feast elsewhere in the (arch)diocese;
-The dedication of a local consecrated church (parish, conventual chapel) is celebrated as a solemnity in that church (with first Vespers) but not elsewhere.

If the actual date of dedication of a church is not known, it is celebrated (at least here) on the 22nd of October.

 

[Razanir]

-The dedication of a local consecrated church (parish, conventual chapel) is celebrated as a solemnity in that church (with first Vespers) but not elsewhere.

Yes, but does it outrank the Octave of Easter or not? By the Table of Liturgical Days, it does not. But by the Missal, it’s implied to. The Missal doesn’t list the Octave as prohibited days, and seems to say the dedication takes precedence over anything else that day.

 

[Gertabelle]

Yes, but does it outrank the Octave of Easter or not? By the Table of Liturgical Days, it does not. But by the Missal, it’s implied to. The Missal doesn’t list the Octave as prohibited days, and seems to say the dedication takes precedence over anything else that day.

I’m confused by your question. Are you assuming the dedication of the church takes precedence because it’s listed first in the commons section of the missal? My missal doesn’t have a Table of Liturgical Days, but that list is the official list of precedents for the Church calendar.

Gertie

 

[Razanir]

I’m confused by your question. Are you assuming the dedication of the church takes precedence because it’s listed first in the commons section of the missal? My missal doesn’t have a Table of Liturgical Days, but that list is the official list of precedents for the Church calendar.

Gertie

I haven’t seen the Missal myself, but I’ve seen it quoted several places. (Note: It might actually be the Lectionary, but misnamed)

When a church is dedicated, the proper Ritual Mass is always used, with the colour white or a festive colour. The dedication of a church, however, is not to take place during the Paschal Triduum, on the Nativity of the Lord, on the Epiphany, on the Ascension, on Pentecost Sunday, on Ash Wednesday, on the weekdays of Holy Week, or on the Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Soul’s Day).

So at least at Mass (and presumably for the LotH), it appears to take precedence over anything, except for the days when you can’t dedicate a church. And everything in bullets 1 and 2 is listed as exceptions, except the Octave of Easter. Which is where the confusion arises, because that’s two contradictory statements.

 

[porthos11]

I haven’t seen the Missal myself, but I’ve seen it quoted several places. (Note: It might actually be the Lectionary, but misnamed)

So at least at Mass (and presumably for the LotH), it appears to take precedence over anything, except for the days when you can’t dedicate a church. And everything in bullets 1 and 2 is listed as exceptions, except the Octave of Easter. Which is where the confusion arises, because that’s two contradictory statements.

The Table of Precedence governs both the Missal and the Breviary, because it’s a matter of the Calendar.

So that said: the Table is clear: Octave of Easter trumps the Solemnity of the Dedication of a church. The anniversary of the dedication is a Solemnity within the church itself. As with any Solemnity overridden by a higher liturgical day, it gets bumped to the next available day that is itself not a Solemnity. What will happen is that if the anniversary of a dedication falls within the Octave of Easter, it will likely get postponed to the next available day.

 

[Gertabelle]

When a church is dedicated

OK, got it.

I think where you’re getting confused is that text above is referring to the actual dedication of the church. The solemnity you would be celebrating in the LotH is anniversary of that dedication. For example, our local parish was dedicated in 1955. At that time, it couldn’t be dedicated on any of the days you listed in your example. But the celebration of the anniversary of that dedication would have to follow the rules of the Table of Liturgical Days.

It looks like you’ve been confusing the rules for dedicating a church with the rules for celebrating the anniversary of that dedication.

Gertie

 

[cardinal08]

There is a tradition in the Church of moving the celebration of a dedication of a church. It was often the case, that if the Church was dedicated during Advent, Lent, or Easter (although there is some ambiguity if this is the Octave or the season of Easter) the dedication of the Church would be celebrated the Sunday before All Saint’s. This was supposed to emphasize the connection of the church on earth and the church in heaven.

With that being said, it is also legitimate to move the celebration to the next available day, like any other feast that might be outranked.

 

[Razanir]

OK, got it.

I think where you’re getting confused is that text above is referring to the actual dedication of the church. The solemnity you would be celebrating in the LotH is anniversary of that dedication. For example, our local parish was dedicated in 1955. At that time, it couldn’t be dedicated on any of the days you listed in your example. But the celebration of the anniversary of that dedication would have to follow the rules of the Table of Liturgical Days.

It looks like you’ve been confusing the rules for dedicating a church with the rules for celebrating the anniversary of that dedication.

Gertie

I’ve been thinking about the actual dedication this whole time…

If the Mass for the actual dedication can be celebrated instead of a day in the octave of Easter, does the same rule also apply to the Liturgy of the Hours that day?

Our new Newman Center is being dedicated this April on Divine Mercy Sunday. Does it make sense to pray the Common of the Dedication of a Church for the LotH that day?

 

[FrDavid96]

I’ve been thinking about the actual dedication this whole time…

If the Mass for the actual dedication can be celebrated instead of a day in the octave of Easter, does the same rule also apply to the Liturgy of the Hours that day?

Our new Newman Center is being dedicated this April on Divine Mercy Sunday. Does it make sense to pray the Common of the Dedication of a Church for the LotH that day?

That explains a lot.

1. A Newman Center is not (by strict definition) a “church;” not in this context. There may be a dedication ceremony of some kind (I don’t doubt there will), but unless the local diocese actually owns the building and the bishop has designated it as a permanent parish church, it’s not a church building in the strictest sense. It’s not impossible, but it is very unlikely that a Newman Center is an actual parish church.
2. The dedication of a church is prohibited during the Easter Triduum, but permitted during the Octave of Easter (so a new church can be dedicated on Divine Mercy Sunday). Both the Triduum & Octave take precedence over the anniversary. That might be where you think there’s a conflict. The dedication might be Divine Mercy Sunday, and that’s fine. But if that date happens to be Easter Sunday or Divine Mercy Sunday, or Palm Sunday in some future year, then the anniversary is not celebrated.

 

[Razanir]

That explains a lot.

1. A Newman Center is not (by strict definition) a “church;” not in this context. There may be a dedication ceremony of some kind (I don’t doubt there will), but unless the local diocese actually owns the building and the bishop has designated it as a permanent parish church, it’s not a church building in the strictest sense. It’s not impossible, but it is very unlikely that a Newman Center is an actual parish church.
2. The dedication of a church is prohibited during the Easter Triduum, but permitted during the Octave of Easter (so a new church can be dedicated on Divine Mercy Sunday). Both the Triduum & Octave take precedence over the anniversary. That might be where you think there’s a conflict. The dedication might be Divine Mercy Sunday, and that’s fine. But if that date happens to be Easter Sunday or Divine Mercy Sunday, or Palm Sunday in some future year, then the anniversary is not celebrated.

1. Actually, I just checked. It actually is listed as a parish on the diocesan website. It doesn’t have its own colored box on the map, but it still gets a mention in the parish directory.
2. So… Pretty much as I expected. I really just needed the confirmation that the Octave of Easter really is where it varies. Thanks!