I for one would like to see the Pope celebrate Mass in the other rites. The Pope is very knowledgable in the Eastern Rites. I had a friend of the family who was bi-ritual. He could say The OF and a Devine Liturgy. Know if the Pope knows how to celebrate “The Devine Liturgy” is a good question? I do not know that. I would like to see it. What would be intresting to see what Language he would say it in? In the Latin Rite, “Latin is the official Language” with the local languages as second. In the Eastern Rite the local language is used. What would the language would be? Another reason why schools should teach about all the Rites of the Church.
If the Holy Father were to celebrate an Eastern rite liturgy he would have to celebrate it in an Eastern rite church. Neither St. Peter’s or his own church, St. John Lateran, are Eastern rite churches. He would have to use the language of that rite.
Does he know those languages? I don’t know. Does he know the rites? Yes. Is it appropriate? That’s a good question. Canonically he is the Pontiff, but he is also the Bishop of Rome, which is a western archdiocese. He is not the patriarch of the east. He used to be the patriarch of the west. But Pope Benedict has eliminated that title. Therefore, he is no longer the patriarch of any Church. That creates another question. Can a bishop who is not a patriarch celebrate in another patriarchy? I don’t know the answer. The Eastern Chruches have their own canon laws. They do not follow our own. There are some things that repeat themselves, such as the laws on sacraments. But there are many more differences between the codes than there are similarities. We would have to know whether the canons of the Eastern Churches allow for a western bishop to celebrate their liturgy.
Our current pope was never bi-ritual. The questioin is can he be multi-ritual, because he is the pope? To the best of my knowledge, this has never been put to the test. I could be wrong. So I would have to defer to my Eastern rite brothers who know that particular history for the answer. We have had Eastern rite popes in the early days of the Church. Once the Italians took over the papacy, that seems to have died out.
We have also had many popes who were religious. Pope Pius V was a Dominican. But according to the history of the Domnicans he did not celebrate the Dominican rite once he became pope. Pope Nicholas IV was a Franciscan and he did observe the Franciscan traditions when he celebrated mass. But Nicholas lived long before Trent. There have also been popes who were monks. But the did not preserve the Carthusian rite when they became pope. They adopted the ordinary form that was in effect at the time for the Latin rite Church.
Tradition would suggest that popes always use the ordinary form of the Latin rite Church, which would explain why Pope Benedict does not use the EF in public. He may use it in his own chapel. This information is not going to be shared with the public, as the Vatican has a tradition of keeping certain things in the internal form, meaning out of the public eye.
As we saw when the Holy Father visited the Holy Land, he celebrated the OF in Latin. He did not use the EF or the Eastern rite, even though Jerusalem has both. The Eastern rite bishops in Jerusalem attended the mass, but did not concelebrate. We see that often in the Vatican too. You will often notice that the Eastern rite bishops and patriarchs sit in with the clergy, but they do not concelebrate in the Latin rite mass.
My speculation is that the Holy Father avoids going back and forth between forms in the Latin rite and between rites in the universal Church to keep the boundaries very smooth and clean. In other words, to avoid confusion among the faithful. It can look like he’s endorsing or promoting something that is not part of the ordinary liturgical life of the Latin Church.
When he opened the possibility to celebrate the Tridentine mass of 1963, he did not encourage the Latin Chuch to embrace it as the official form. He very deliberately referred to it as the Extraordinary form, as we refer to extraordinary Eucharistic ministers, meaning that it is allowed, but not the norm. Had he wanted to make it the norm, he would not have called it extraordinary. He would have used some other word or simply said that there are two forms available and let the reader interpret it. But by using the term “extraordinary” it becomes quite clear that this is not for everyone, but for those who want it. In other words, we cannot give the impression that he wants to impose it on every Latin rite Catholic. He wants to make it available, which is different. I’m glad that he did make it available. Because so many people do get a lot out of it. But in charity, neither those who get something out of the EF or the OF should impose the form on others.
It would make sense that the Holy Father, as the head of the Church and as a Latin rite bishop use what is ordinary or usual, if you want to use that word.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
