Don’t worry if it all seems strange and diffeent - that’s a normal reaction!
In this awesome 40-minute video Fr. Calvin Goodwin, FSSP, offers a spiritual commentary on the Mass given in real time as a priest celebrates the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite.
Sung Mass is a Low Mass.
My advice for the first few times is not to sit too close to the front. If you sit with people in front of you then you can follow when to kneel, when to stand and when to sit.
Only in a very technical sense. Most Sung Masses today involve incense, and all involve chant and music, so that is not really an accurate description.
Yesterday morning I visited a Catholic Church in our town called St Mary Oratory where the Mass was all in Latin. I had never been to a Latin Mass before and felt lost. (What is the difference between a regular Catholic Church and an Oratory?) Also what does a person do if they aren’t familiar with a Latin Mass?
Don’t worry about keeping up with all the prayers in your missal the first time. In fact, I wouldn’t even use the missal unless you really want to. For most people it takes going several times before they get into the rhythm of things.
There was no singing by the way.It is a perfectly accurate description. It is the sacred ministers that determine whether a Mass is high or low - not the presence of music or incense.
Actually, rubric/paragraph 271 of the 1960 code of rubrics states that:
The above quotation is taken directly from: maternalheart.org/library/1962rubrics.pdf page 51, paragraph 271, if you wish to confirm the accuracy of my statement.
Not always
Thus a Sung Mass can be Missa Cantata or Missa Solemnis, depending on the absence or presence of sacred ministers (deacon, subdeacon, etc.).
No, the presence of sacred ministers determines if a Mass is Solemn, not High. Under the 1962 missal, High Masses are either Solemn or Sung. The revised 1960 rubrics changed the term Solemn High Mass to just Solemn Mass (Missa Solemnis). This was done to reflect that fact that an indult was no longer needed to have incense at a Missa Cantata, and that more Masses were *"*Simple High Masses, i,.e., Sung Mass…
Sorry - I think I was having a blond moment. You are of course correct and I made a complete pigs ear of making the point I was trying to make.
NO NO NO
The point I have been trying to make (badly sometimes) is that a Mass is only a High Mass when a deacon and subdeacon are present (the sacred ministers). The addition of music or incense doesn’t make a Mass a High Mass.
Catholic Encyclopedia has a good article on oratories. It’s basically a place of prayer set aside by ecclesiastical authority for prayer and the celebration of Mass, but it is not a parish church.Yesterday morning I visited a Catholic Church in our town called St Mary Oratory where the Mass was all in Latin. I had never been to a Latin Mass before and felt lost. (What is the difference between a regular Catholic Church and an Oratory?) Also what does a person do if they aren’t familiar with a Latin Mass?