Has Easter Mass ever been canceled?

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Abrahaj

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Our bishops have prudently mandated that we can’t gather for Mass right now. I was wondering if this sort of thing has ever happened before in the history of the Church. In other words, have the faithful ever been dispensed of their Sunday Mass obligation for the best interest of themselves? During persecution? Black Death? Communism? War?..
 
In this diocese, no Masses have been said, by order of the Bishop, since 3/18. No exception has been made for Easter.
 
GEddie said:
In this diocese, no Masses have been said, by order of the Bishop, since 3/18. No exception has been made for Easter.
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Private Masses will still be said. It is public mass that is cancelled.
 
ralfyman said:
I don’t think the OP is referring to private Masses.
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The fact that the Mass is offered is more important than whether I am physically able to attend. This is coming from someone who was at Mass about four times a week until this happened.

Protestant reformers rejected the whole idea of a private Mass, supposedly a church service was meaningless without a congregation.
But Catholics understood the value of such Masses, or they did until the 1960s.

The attitude today is far more subjective, or consumerist. We hear “That was a good (or bad) Mass, I got a lot out of it”, or not.
Or “I have to go where I’m gonna be fed”. These comments were rarely heard in the 1950s. In the 1950s Catholics attended Mass because they knew it was powerful; it did not draw its power from their attendance.

Then you have the whole anti bishops mentality fostered by the secular media, and by faux Catholic websites.
 
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commenter said:
Or “I have to go where I’m gonna be fed”. These comments were rarely heard in the 1950s. In the 1950s Catholics attended Mass because they knew it was powerful; it did not draw its power from their attendance.
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Good point. But to be fair to Catholics today, the new Mass coupled with the versus populum orientation by its very nature tends to engender the kind of “congregation is necessary” attitude, whereas the common Mass offered in the 1950s did not.

Mass too often today is considered an exchange between people (usually priest and congregation or congregation among themselves). One popular theologian recently called private Masses “liturgical onanism.” If Mass is merely an exchange between people, and only the priest was present, then that crude and blasphemous analogy actually would make some sense. But it is instead an exchange between God and man, so as long as there is even one man (the priest) and one God, it is a fruitful exchange for the whole world.

Surely, it is better when we can gather together in His name to adore Him as one body united with the priest, representing Christ our head, but it is not empty when we do not. We can still unite our intentions, as any traditional morning offering does.
 
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Genesis315 said:
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commenter:
Or “I have to go where I’m gonna be fed”. These comments were rarely heard in the 1950s. In the 1950s Catholics attended Mass because they knew it was powerful; it did not draw its power from their attendance.
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Mass too often today is considered an exchange between people (usually priest and congregation or congregation among themselves). … it is instead an exchange between God and man, so as long as there is even one man (the priest) and one God, it is a fruitful exchange for the whole world.

Surely, it is better when we can gather together in His name to adore Him as one body united with the priest, representing Christ our head, but it is not empty when we do not. We can still unite our intentions, as any traditional morning offering does.
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At any public or private Mass, the Church is actually crowded!

Sadly most young Catholics now would have no idea of the Morning Offering:

“…in union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, through out the world…”
 
commenter said:
The fact that the Mass is offered is more important than whether I am physically able to attend. This is coming from someone who was at Mass about four times a week until this happened.
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^^ This. (And I was attending Mass almost every day for a couple years before this happened.)

The tremendous value of Holy Mass does not somehow diminish because the priest is saying Mass without a crowd in physical attendance.
Many of the Masses certainly have attendees following along virtually on video, which also counts as a form of participation in the prayer of the Mass. Those people could have spent the half hour or the hour doing something else, instead they chose to “be at Mass” in the only possible way.
 
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Easter Mass, nor any other Mass, is cancelled. They are simply being celebrated without a congregation.
 
ralfyman said:
I don’t think the OP is referring to private Masses.
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Doesn’t matter. A “private” Mass is still a public Mass, even without the people present, as the very nature of the liturgy is public. A Mass said by a priest alone is public. A Divine Office recited by a layman alone is public.

Masses without a congregation during the Triduum may be unprecedented (and ordinarily, forbidden which is why the Holy See had to issue dispensations for this year), but Masses are by no means cancelled. The efficacy the Mass is unchanged regardless of whether a congregation is present or not.
 
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Thank you for all of your helpful responses. I’m still wondering though if this is completely unprecedented or if something like this has ever happened before in the Church’s history. Anything come to mind? I know that “canceled” wasn’t the best word selection, but have the bishops ever offered a widespread dispensation to the faithful for their Mass obligation like this?
 
Yes. It has happened MANY times before.

If you need comfort, please listen to this homily by a very holy, faithful priest from the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter.


“https://mcusercontent.com/cc5370170...4d691ae/Spiritual_Communion_and_Gods_Will.mp3”

Also: Easter Mass is NOT canceled. Priests in every PARISH will still celebrate Easter Mass. The only difference it the public will not be there.

NOTE: I HIGHLY RECOMMEND LISTENING TO THE ABOVE

God Bless
 
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Abrahaj said:
Thank you for all of your helpful responses. I’m still wondering though if this is completely unprecedented or if something like this has ever happened before in the Church’s history. Anything come to mind? I know that “canceled” wasn’t the best word selection, but have the bishops ever offered a widespread dispensation to the faithful for their Mass obligation like this?
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Spanish Flu
Black Plague
World Wars
Etc.

It’s happened many times. Now, I don’t know how many times it has happened on Easter Sunday, but this is NOT unprecedented.

Again, please listen to the homily I posted above. It will be a HUGE help to you, as it was to me.
 
Mass is Mass whether we are there physically or as part of the Communion of Saints.

Our good priests and Bishops daily celebrate Mass for us all.
 
I don’t think he’s asking whether or not Mass is no longer offered. Rather, whether or not the mandate that “we can’t gather for Mass right now” has happened in the past. Obviously, it has.
 
He’s not asking whether or not the Mass is diminished if no one attends but whether or not in the past the Church has mandated that the faithful “can’t gather for Mass.” The answer is “yes.”
 
I think the problem is that they read only the title of your thread but not your post, so they thought all along that you were referring to the Mass itself disallowed and not people disallowed from gathering to attend it.
 
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