How Can We Discuss Mass Without Liturgy Of The Hours?

[JReducation]

As I read through so many of these threads I am amazed at how much time goes into arguing the merits of the EF or the OF forms of the mass.

But I have noticed a deficit on both sides of this discussion. There seems to be missing an understanding of the complete liturgy. The liturgy is not just the mass. In fact there are three liturgies, two of them make up what we call the mass, the Liturgy of the Word, the Liturgy of the Eucharist (make up the mass), and the Liturgy of the Hours (Divine Office).

Everyone pulling in one direction or the other, EF or OF, but everyone is talking about the mass and forgetting that the Liturgy of the Hours is an essential part of the Liturgical life of the Church and that you cannot have one without the other. They go together and must harmonize. This was said by Pius V and confirmed by Vatican II.

Maybe this is why the Tridentine form is being called the EF instead of the Ordinary form. If you make the Tridentine form the Ordinary form, you must also reinstate the Liturgy of the Hours to the Tridentine form. There are several practical problems with this.

Who is going to pray the Liturgy of the Hours in the Tridentine form? The liturgy of the Hours in the Tridentine form was prayed every three hours or eight times a day. It was meant to be prayed by the entire Church. Eventually only those in monastic orders or mendicants could keep up with it. The laity dropped it. So did secular priests. Most religious men and women who are not members of religious orders, but belong to apostolic congregations also had to drop it or cheat on it by skipping some hours.

From being the official prayer of the Church it became the prayer of mendicant friars and monastic men and women.

The Church wants to make the Liturgy of the Hours available to every man and women. Granted, monastic and mendicant communities must pray it under pain of mortal sin, because they make solemn vows, but it was not meant to be their responsibility. The Church imposed that moral responsibility on them to keep it from dying out. Because the Church believes as a matter of faith, that the mass MUST be complemented by the Liturgy of the Hours. To complement it, the form must be the same, the calendar must be the same and the prayers must carry over from one to the other.

We know that you cannot separate the ordinary form of the mass from the form of the Liturgy of the Hours.

If you make the Tridentine form the ordinary form, it begs a question.
How many lay people, diocesan priests, religious in simple vows can really pray the Liturgy of the Hours in the Tridentine form? Who knows how to do it and has the time to do it?

Do we want the Liturgy of the Hours to go back into the monastery and hide behind the cloister? Do we want our diocesan priests and religious in simple vows to stop their ministry every three hours to send 30 minutes in the Liturgy of the Hours? Is it fair to impose a penalty of mortal sin and excommunication on religious with solemn vows, just to keep up the prayer of the Church, because no one else has the time or the desire to keep up with it and the Church must have it. It goes with the mass. They cannot be separated. This is Church theology.

1175 The Liturgy of the Hours is intended to become the prayer of the whole People of God. In it Christ himself “continues his priestly work through his Church.” His members participate according to their own place in the Church and the circumstances of their lives: priests devoted to the pastoral ministry, because they are called to remain diligent in prayer and the service of the word; religious, by the charism of their consecrated lives; all the faithful as much as possible: “Pastors of souls should see to it that the principal hours, especially Vespers, are celebrated in common in church on Sundays and on the more solemn feasts. The laity, too, are encouraged to recite the divine office, either with the priests, or among themselves, or even individually.” (CCC)

JR

 

[Jeanette_L]

JR - I’m not really very familiar with the forms of Liturgy and the rules so I’d like a little further explanation if you don’t mind.

So, what’s to stop the Church from incorporating a different form of the Liturgy of the Hours into the Tridentine Mass in order to make it work better for today’s Church? In other words, make it more like the NO Liturgy of the Hours as far as the timing or spacing of the prayers? Can this be done? What would stop something like this?

Thanks!

 

[JReducation]

JR - I’m not really very familiar with the forms of Liturgy and the rules so I’d like a little further explanation if you don’t mind.

So, what’s to stop the Church from incorporating a different form of the Liturgy of the Hours into the Tridentine Mass in order to make it work better for today’s Church? In other words, make it more like the NO Liturgy of the Hours as far as the timing or spacing of the prayers? Can this be done? What would stop something like this?

Thanks!

Those are good questions the answer is fairly simple.

1. The Liturgy of the Hours or Divine Office as it was once called must be prayed around the clock.
2. The form must be the same as the form of the masss. This means that the prayers must complement each other and that the Liturgy of the Hours has to follow the same liturgical calendar and should be in the same language as the mass. This can be either Latin or the local language.
3. If you make the Tridentine mass the Ordinary form of the Liturgy, you have to restore the Tridentine Liturgy of the Hours. Because if it is the ordinary form of the Liturgy, then the entire liturgy has to follow that form. The entire liturgy includes the Liturgy of the Hours, not just the mass.
4. The Tridentine form of the Liturgy of the Hours must be chanted in Gregorian Chant and in Latin.
5. The Tridentine form must be prayed every three hours, because that’s the way the Jews prayed it and that’s the way it was carried over into the Christian community. If you take away the Latin and the Gregorian chant, then it does not harmonize with the Tridentine mass. You can have a Tridentine liturgy of the hours withou the chant, except on Solmenities such as Sundays and other Holy Days of Obligation. On those days you have have a solemn celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours.
6. If you change the number of times that the Tridentine form of the Liturgy of the Hours is prayed, then you are really changing the tradition. All you have is a Latin form of the New Liturgy of the Hours.
7. The OF (NO) of the Liturgy of the Hours consist of Morning Prayer, Office of Readings, Evening Prayer and Night Prayer. Mid-day Prayer and Mid-Afernoon Prayer are optional.
8. The Tridentine form of the liturgy of the Hours only worked for religious who lived in monasteries and never left. They have the time to pray around the clock and they get up in the middle of the night to pray the mid-night hour.
9. Diocesan priests, religious in simple vows, and lay people do not have that kind of time. Everntually, the Liturgy of the Hours became the obligation of monastic communities and the laity stopped praying it.
10. The Church wants the laity to pray it. She wants diocesan priests and religious in simple vows to pray it. The only way that it can be done is to keep the form shorter and with less hours, also to give people the option of praying it in Latin or in their language and the option of reading it or chanting it. The more complicated you make it, the less people will pray it. This is why it has almost disappeared among the laity.
11. It would be a great injustice to the Tridentine form to trim and cut the Tridentine of the Liturgy of the Hours to fit the modern man’s schedule. What you would end up with is a bybrid between the Tridentine and the Ordinary form of the Liturgy of the Hours. The Tridentine form is very beautiful, but not practical.
12. As long as it is not practical for the universal Church it cannot be made into the official form. If you can’t make the Tridentine Liturgy of the Hours the Official form of the Prayer of the Church, you can’t make the Tridentine mass the official form either.

The Official Prayer of the Churhc has to harmonize.

Imagine it like a beautiful wedding. You can’t do the Church in blue and white ribbons and the reception in red and gold ribbons. Both are beautiful, but there is disparity.

Hope this helps.

JR

 

[Jeanette_L]

Those are good questions the answer is fairly simple.

The Official Prayer of the Church has to harmonize.

Imagine it like a beautiful wedding. You can’t do the Church in blue and white ribbons and the reception in red and gold ribbons. Both are beautiful, but there is disparity.

Hope this helps.

JR

It does help. I had no clue about any of this to be honest. So I have learned something today.

 

[JReducation]

It does help. I had no clue about any of this to be honest. So I have learned something today.

What makes all of this sad is that some people are willing to sacrifice the Liturgy of the Hours and return it to the cloisters of monasteries, just to make the EF the ordinary form of the mass.

Because if the EF becomes the ordinary form, the Tridentine Liturgy of the Hours must also become the ordinary form. They go together.

As I said above, diocesan priests, religious in simple vows and laity cannot follow this regime.

Therefore, the Liturgy of the Hours, which is part of the Official Prayer of the Church, once again goes back into the cloister.

How can we call it the Official Prayer of the Church, if one one group of voices in the Church is praying?

How can we say that the Church prays around the clock, when only one group of people really have the time, the training and the opportunity to pray around the clock?

The Liturgy of the Hours would become a symbol of the Church at prayer, but not really the Church at prayer. It would be monks, friars and nuns assuming the responsibility of the entire Church and praying in the name of the Church, because the rest of us can’t keep up with it.

This was one of the beneficts of the changes in the form of the liturgy. When the form of the liturgy was changed, the form of the the Hours was also changed to harmonize. Becasue everything has to be the same colour, like a wedding.

The new form of the Liturgy of the Hours has since been picked up by Diocesan priests, religious in simple vows and many lay people. It is slowly coming out of the cloister. In some parishes, people get together to pray it every morning and every evening.

If you watch EWTN, people attend the nun’s chapel to pray it with the nuns. The nuns do not use the Tridentine form. They use the NO form of the Liturgy of the Hours, which is shorter and easier for the average lay person to follow and does not have to be prayed around the clock.

Some lay people learn to pray it on their own and purchase their own Breviaries.

I pray with with my community or by myself, because you don’t need a community to pray it, though ideally you should pray it in community. Some people pray it as a family, usually on Sundays and Holy Days.

In my parish, we have religious, they open the doors to their chapel to allow the laity to pray with them in the morning and the evening. Because they do not chant and they use the English, the laity can pray along easily. It’s not surprising to have 10 to 15 lay persons at the chapel to pray with the friars.

I’d hate to see it go back to the way it was, where no one knew it existed or where everyone believed that it was the obligation of friars, monks and nuns to keep prayer going around the clock while the rest of us went about our business.

That’s not how the Church should pray. We should all enter Eternity together. Afterall, we are one body.

JR

 

[Mickey_Jackson]

I often take somewhat guilty pleasure in the fact that when Pope St. Pius V promulgated his version of the Liturgy of the Hours, he did so with the same language with which he promulgated the Tridentine Mass, saying that it was to be enforced “in perpetuity,” that anyone who changed a word of the text would incur the wrath of Ss. Peter and Paul, etc., etc. And then in the 20th century, a certain Pope was subjected to much criticism when he radically revised the Breviary.

This Pope’s name? It wasn’t Paul VI; it was that raving Modernist, St. Pius X!!!

I just love irony.

 

[JReducation]

I often take somewhat guilty pleasure in the fact that when Pope St. Pius V promulgated his version of the Liturgy of the Hours, he did so with the same language with which he promulgated the Tridentine Mass, saying that it was to be enforced “in perpetuity,” that anyone who changed a word of the text would incur the wrath of Ss. Peter and Paul, etc., etc. And then in the 20th century, a certain Pope was subjected to much criticism when he radically revised the Breviary.

This Pope’s name? It wasn’t Paul VI; it was that raving Modernist, St. Pius X!!!

I just love irony.

The subscript is mine.

I too love irony. St. Pius the X began the process of revising the Breviary. Later Paul VI revised it again.

What is even more irony is that if you read the entire encyclical by Pius V, he makes some very important points:

1. The Liturgy of the Hours must harmonize with the mass. Everyone argues for the Tridentine mass and no one mentions the Liturgy of the Hours.
2. If you read past the paragraph that you just cited he makes a long list of those who cannot change this: clerics, religioius, bishops, cardinals or anyone with any authority in the Church, but he leave out popes. He never says that popes cannot change this decree. In essence, this is what in Church tradition is called a Bull not an infallible statement.
3. The difference between a Bull and an infallible statement is that an infallible statement makes a declaration of what the Church believes, not what the Church must do. This encyclical is about doing. “You must say the mass this way and you must pray the Liturgy of the Hours this way.” There is not new doctrine taught. Otherwise it would have been binding on popes too. He never mentions popes in his list of people who may never touch the Liturgy.
4. The fact that St. Pious X changed the Liturgy of the Hours from what St. Pius V has declared as untouchable, shows us that the popes understood that this declaration was not meant for them. That’s why Paul VI and John Paul II felt comfortable making more changes.

It is unfortunate that some people are turning CAF into a forum for defending the Tridentine mass, attacking popes, and forgetting that liturgy is more than mass.

The Liturgy of the Hours is an essential part of the liturgy. If you want to reform Litturgy or restore it to the Tridentine form, you must do the entire thing, not just the mass. It’s a package deal. This has never changed

Sacrifice and Liturgy of the Hours went together since pre-Christian erra to this day in both East and West. Even Anglicans and High Church Lutherans maintain this practice. They more traditional than some people who call themselves traditionalists.

If we want to be traditional, it OK as long as we do it right. Otherwise, let the Tridentine mass stand alone as an extraordinary form (EF) of the Roman Rite and allow the ordinary form (OF) which has a all three forms of liturgy continue to be the official liturgy of the Western Church.

Let’s not force the Liturgy of the Hours to disappear back into cloistered monasteries. And let’s not impose our obligaton to Pray around the clock on monks, friars and nuns to do it for us while we go about our business. This will not achieve our sanctification as efficaciously as each of us participating in the mass and praying the Liturgy of the Hours.

JR

 

[peregrinus_sg]

Some problems.

1. The form must be the same as the form of the masss. This means that the prayers must complement each other and that the Liturgy of the Hours has to follow the same liturgical calendar and should be in the same language as the mass. This can be either Latin or the local language.

There is no requirement that the prayers “complement”. The Roman Missal, for example, provides several Mass formularies for ritual Masses as well as Masses for Various Needs and Intentions, none of which are available in the Liturgy of the Hours. Yes, the ICEL edition includes a list of optional prayers taken from the Masses for Various Needs and Intentions, but there are no such additions in the Latin typical editions.

There is also no recommendation that the language be the same as the language of the Mass. That’s just silly nonsense.

1. If you make the Tridentine mass the Ordinary form of the Liturgy, you have to restore the Tridentine Liturgy of the Hours. Because if it is the ordinary form of the Liturgy, then the entire liturgy has to follow that form. The entire liturgy includes the Liturgy of the Hours, not just the mass.

I honestly don’t understand the logic here. Any Catholic may attend an Eastern Catholic liturgy. Does that mean he has to pray the Eastern hours for that day too? The liturgy of the hours in both the EF and OF belong to the Roman liturgy of the Church. Don’t forget that the EF and OF are two forms of the same Roman liturgy, not 2 different liturgies.

1. The Tridentine form of the Liturgy of the Hours must be chanted in Gregorian Chant and in Latin.

Actually, aren’t there plenty of vernacular translations of the Roman breviary, even on eBay lately?

The Church encourages that the psalms in both the OF and EF be chanted according to the Gregorian modes. But then, as now, most priests would just recite the psalms.

1. The Tridentine form must be prayed every three hours, because that’s the way the Jews prayed it and that’s the way it was carried over into the Christian community. If you take away the Latin and the Gregorian chant, then it does not harmonize with the Tridentine mass. You can have a Tridentine liturgy of the hours withou the chant, except on Solmenities such as Sundays and other Holy Days of Obligation. On those days you have have a solemn celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours.

Don’t people normally had low Mass, where there were minimal chants in the Mass prior to Vatican II? Even in EF of the Mass today, I don’t think everything is chanted everyday.

1. The OF (NO) of the Liturgy of the Hours consist of Morning Prayer, Office of Readings, Evening Prayer and Night Prayer. Mid-day Prayer and Mid-Afernoon Prayer are optional.

For priests and Bishops, they are obliged to pray one of the Prayers during the Day. For laity with no obligation, you may choose any or all of the prayers, though Lauds and Vespers were encouraged.

Actually, the same is true for the EF too. Laity with no obligation could say any or all of the prayers and do not need to pray every 3 hours. In fact, before the Church permitted vigil Masses on Saturdays, it was common for parish churches to have solemn vespers on Saturday and Sunday evenings, in which the people participated. After Vatican II, when Masses multiplied on Sundays and Saturdays, for better or for worse, out went the custom of solemn parish vespers.

 

[BenFischer]

Some problems.

For priests and Bishops, they are obliged to pray one of the Prayers during the Day. For laity with no obligation, you may choose any or all of the prayers, though Lauds and Vespers were encouraged.

Actually, the same is true for the EF too. Laity with no obligation could say any or all of the prayers and do not need to pray every 3 hours. In fact, before the Church permitted vigil Masses on Saturdays, it was common for parish churches to have solemn vespers on Saturday and Sunday evenings, in which the people participated. After Vatican II, when Masses multiplied on Sundays and Saturdays, for better or for worse, out went the custom of solemn parish vespers.

That’s how it looks to me as well. The only thing that the VII Liturgy of the Hours suppressed was Prime. All the other hours are there: just the requirements have changed. If you want, you can pray every 3 hours during the day, but the clergy is only required to pray Lauds, Vespers and one of the “little hours” of the day (I think). The Office of Readings (Matins) can be said anytime. It seems that if the Vatican were to re-institute the older Divine Office as the only acceptable form, they could easily do so with the same conditions in place.

 

[JReducation]

“With the Catechism published for the instruction of the faithful, by God’s help, and the Breviary thoroughly revised for the worthy praise of God, in order that the Missal and Breviary may be in perfect harmony, as fitting and proper - for its most becoming that there be in the Church only one appropriate manner of reciting the Psalms and only one rite for the celebration of Mass” (Pius V, Quo Primum)

Pius V specifically demanded that the Missal and the Breviary be in perfect harmony. This practice is maintained to this day. For example, if you belong to a parish run by Franciscans, you will observe that they have the Franciscan Missal, not the Roman missal, they use the Franciscan Breviary and the Franciscan liturgical calendar. Everything is in harmony. The same is found among the Benedictines, and Carmelites. When they composed their missal, they had to compose a lectionary and a breviary to harmonize, because the rule of their respective orders demanded that they pray the liturgy according the rules of the Church, safeguarding the traditions of their Order.

This harmonizing between lectionary, Sacramentary and breviary is still carried out today according the will of Vatican II. When the liturgical reform of the mass came about, the Sacred Congregation on Liturgy saw it necessary to reform the Liturgy of the Hours to complement the mass. It was the intention of the Sacred Congregation to bring those in simple vows, diocesan priests, deacons, secular bishops and the laity together into the Liturgy of the Hours so that the whole Church could pray the Official Prayer of the Church, rather than delegate it to monks, friars and nuns as it had been in the past.

If we are to bring back the Tridentine mass as the ordinary form, we must also comply with Pius V intent to perfectly harmonize the breviary. Pius did this because this was to be the ordinary form.

As to what happens if you attend a Byzantine mass, this is not the same situation. If you attend a Byzantine mass that is not your ordinary form, therefore you are not bound to pray the liturgy of the hours using their rite. However, those Catholics who belong to the Eastern Churches are obliged to pray the breviary according the rite to which they belong, because that’s their ordinary form.

Just as if you attended mass at a Franciscan parish or a Benedictine Abbey, you use their lectionary and Sacramentary, but unless you’re a Franciscan, you are not obliged to use the Franciscan breviary or the Benedictine breviary. That is not your community.

If we made the Tridentine the ordinary form for the universal Church then we have to bring back the Liturgy of the Hours that goes with it, because that was what was in the mind of Pius V, that they be inseparable.

It is very easy to call something nonsense. However, it is much more difficult to be holy and try to harmonize the prayer of the Church so that all can share in its grace.

**Can. 276 §1. In leading their lives, clerics are bound in a special way to pursue holiness since, having been consecrated to God by a new title in the reception of orders, they are dispensers of the mysteries of God in the service of His people.

3/ priests and deacons aspiring to the presbyterate are obliged to carry out the liturgy of the hours daily according to the proper and approved liturgical books; permanent deacons, however, are to carry out the same to the extent defined by the conference of bishops;**

Canon Law does not demand any particular hour to be said by clerics, except those that are prescribed in the Directory of the Liturgy of the Hours which are Morning and Evening Prayer and one of the minor hours.

Can. 1175 In carrying out the liturgy of the hours, the true time for each hour is to be observed insofar as possible.

The law speaks for itself. If you make the Tridentine form of the Liturgy of the Hours the ordinary form, you must follow the law. This is very difficult for the laity, secular deacons, secular priests, secular bishops and religious in simple vows.

There is logic in letting the Tridentine form stand as the EF. If you make it the OF, you have to bring back the Tridentine Breviary and make that the OF of the Liturgy of the Hours.

As it stands with the Motu Proprio, it works for everyone. Those who want the Tridentine mass have it, whether they’re religious, clerics or laity, but are not bound to the Tridentine form of the Liturgy of the Hours as revised by Pius V.

Pius X saw this complication and tried to correct it by reworking the Roman Breviary and it helped to some extent. His revisions allowed secular priests and religious in simple vows to pray the Hours.

Vatican II wanted all Catholics to join in the Official Prayer of the Church and revised it again. Yes, it is true that the EF and OF are two forms, not to rites, but each form has its own beauty and its own sanctity that cannot be denied. Whichever is chosen as the Ordinary Form, has to spill over into the Liturgy of the Hours. Otherwise you have dissonance in the Liturgy.

The point is that we’re talking about The Liturgy, not just the mass.

JR

 

[PKinsale]

JR, I think you overstate the connection and requirements a bit. You almost seem to be arguing that the alleged difficulty of the older Office means we should eschew the TLM.

I do hope that one reform to come will restore a unified Calendar, not just between the old and new Masses, but across provinces so we all celebrate the major universal feasts (such as Ascension THURSDAY) on the same day.

 

[JReducation]

JR, I think you overstate the connection and requirements a bit. You almost seem to be arguing that the alleged difficulty of the older Office means we should eschew the TLM.

I do hope that one reform to come will restore a unified Calendar, not just between the old and new Masses, but across provinces so we all celebrate the major universal feasts (such as Ascension THURSDAY) on the same day.

That’s not what I’m trying to say. I’m sorry if I was not clear enough. I was trying to say that the reason why the Tridentine mass is the EF is because there would have to be a return to all Tridentine Liturgies, if you make it the OF.

By all means, keep the Tridentine mass around. That’s not a problem.

As to the unified Calendar that’s a little more difficult. Not only do you have differences between episcopal conferences, but you also have differences between religious orders in solemn vows and the rest of the Church.

The three large religious orders in solemn vows have their own liturgical calendar, missal, lectionary and breviary. Like I said before, the differences are subtle and the average lay person would not even notice it, but they are important to the Orders.

Since these Order have what is called Pontifical Right, they only have to follow the liturgy in what pertains to the universal Church, but they also have their own holy days which the universal Church does not celebrate and they even have their own Solemnities which the universal Church does not celebrate. However, they do celebrate the solemnities of the universal Church, just not all of the feast days. They even have their own litany of saints which is hybrid between the litany of saints of the universal Church and the saints of the Order. Orders like the Franciscans have their own rosary that is different from the rosary of the universal Church. It’s called the Franciscan Crown. The Friars Minor do not use crucifixes because St. Francis did not allow it. They use a plain cross, because each one of us must embrace the cross and become crucified as Christ did.

These are little things that take nothing away from the faith. In fact they add to the faith. The Benedictines also have their own crucifix which is slightly different from the universal Church and they use it at their masses.

If you unified the calendar, this richness which is part of the beauty of the Church will be lost forever.

I think that we want to keep the conributions of the Benedictines, Dominicans, Carmelites and Franciscans. They have made a great impact on the life and faith of the Church.

I’m not sure, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the Society of Jesus has its own liturgical calender, missal, lectionary and breviary, even though they are not an order.

My point is keep the EF and the OF with its mass and Liturgy of the Hours.

We have to remember, that when the Liturgy of the Hours was first formalized by Pius V there were no religious in simple vows and secular priests were few.

Religious in simple vows came into existence with St. Vincent de Paul and secular priests grew in numbers long after Pius V.

That’s why Pius X rewrote the Breviary, so that secular priests could pray it and it would still harmonize with the mass of the day.

Paul the VI rewrote it again, for the same reason, so that it would harmonize with the NO. The popes have always wanted the Breviary to harmonize with the ordinary form of the liturgy or the form used by the religious community.

The current breviary is written to harmonize with the current OF, even in gestures. It was also written so that the laity could begin to use it.

The Tridentine breviary was not intended for the laity, because of its complexity and rubrics. Like I said, Pius X tried to rectify that, but it didn’t quite work.

JR

 

[peregrinus_sg]

Help me to understand a word that you have used, for which I may have a different understanding from you: harmony. What exactly constitutes harmony between the Missal and teh Breviary?

Even in the OF Liturgy of the Hours, the General Instruction permits a variety of calendars to be chosen.

1. The office in choir and in common is to be celebrated according to the proper calendar of the diocese, of the religious family, or of the individual churches. [3] Members of religious institutes join with the community of the local Church in celebrating the dedication of the cathedral and the feasts of the principal patrons of the place and of the wider geographical region in which they live.

1. When clerics or religious who are obliged under any title to pray the divine office join in an office celebrated in common according to a calendar or rite different from their own, they fulfill their obligation in respect to the part of the office at which they are present.

1. In private celebration, the calendar of the place or the person’s own calendar may be followed, except on proper solemnities and on proper feasts.

There is no requirement, not even for a priest, when not celebrating in choir to use the General Roman Calendar except for the stated solemnities and feasts.

In any case, what is proper for the Roman liturgy today is decided by the current Roman Pontiff, Pope Benedict XVI. Not Pope Pius V. If Pope St Pius V, whose feast we remember soon, desired that the Breviary and Missal be exactly the same, the present Pope, acting under the guidance of the same Holy Spirit, can decide to remove this requirement. As far as I can see, Pope Benedict’s Motu Proprio has done precisely just that, and given liberty to priests

Art 9.2 Clerics ordained “in sacris constitutis” may use the Roman Breviary promulgated by Bl. John XXIII in 1962.

 

[PKinsale]

I am not opposed at all the religious orders using their traditional rites and calendars. What bothers me is the way certain feasts are moved around in some provinces and not others (Ascension being the prime example). Another example is the way the Archdiocese of Los Angeles erred in removing the obligation this year for attending Mass on Jan. 1.

Major universal feasts should be all be celebrated on the same day across calendars. Catholic laity should be encouraged to attend such feasts on weekdays, and maintaining the obligation does this.

 

[JReducation]

These points are all good points and deserve consideration.

Maybe I should have been more clear where my starting point was. Allow me to go back to that and then forward.

There are many posters on CAF who insist that the Tridentine form must be the ordinary form and that the current ordinary form of the mass become the extraordinary form. They base their argument on Pius V encyclical, which they consider to be infallible.

If we follow the encyclical promulgated by Pius V we must notice that in the encyclical he clearly states that the Breviary must be in perfect harmony with the mass. When Pius V reformed the mass, because there were too many forms out there, he also reformed the Breviary.

The Breviary that he promulgated followed the exact liturgical calendar as the mass. It also followed the format of the mass, with high holy days celebrated with great solemnity and the feasts and memorials celebrated following the same format at the low mass.

This meant that the Breviary had to be chanted in Gregorian chant on high holy days and could be read on low days. He also distributed the hours of the Divine Office to coincide with the Hours of the Jewish prayer day, which was every three hours, including at night.

The situation was different at the time of Pius V, because there were few secular priests. Most priests were friars or monks. Even then, this proved to be impractical for some religious orders such as Franciscans. Eventually Francis had already forbidden the use of Gregorian chant in his order. The Holy See had to grant an indult to Friars Minor so they could be faithful to the desires and designs of their founder.

Later the Caremelites, also friars, found that this was not practical, becasue it was in conflict with the intentions of St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross. Both objected to the use of the Gregorian chant and the also wanted to simplify the mass and the Divine Office to be more consistent with the form of worship of the Patriarchs of Israel whom they seek to follow. An indult had to be granted to them.

As the number of secular priests grew, the found that praying the Divine Office as Pius V has formatted it was difficult for the secular man who has to go out and make a living, since secular priests are not part of a religious community they have to work to eat. Eventually, Pius X reformatted the Divine Office to accommodate secular priests.

What ended up happening was the the Breviary as formatted by Pius V was prayed only in cloistered monasteries. This was not in the theology of the Church.

The theology of the Church was that the Divine Office should be the official prayer of the universal Church, including the laity.

When the NO was released, the Congregation on the Liturgy simplified the Divine Office by suppressing Prime and making other hours optional with the exception of morning and evening prayer and one minor hours, preferably night prayer. The requirement that the hours be prayed every three hours was eliminated. The only requirement is that the hours be prayed at the appropriate time of day.

The NO also said that the Liturgy of the Hours follows the Liturgy of the mass as closely as possible, with the exceptions that have been stated above.

If the Church were to apply Pius V encyclical in its entirety, based on the argument that it is infallible and cannot be deviated from, then we would also have to implement the Breviary the way that he formatted it.

As we have seen, the Breviary as he formatted it did not work out the way that he thought it would.

My point is that you cannot apply Pius V encyclical as he wrote it, because it didn’t work in the past and it won’t work now that we have more secular priests and more religious in simple vows. There were no religious in simple vows in Pius’ time.

The best thing to do is to let the Tridentine form of the mass stand as the extraordinary form without changing back to the Tridentine Breviary and the NO stands as the ordinary form of the mass and the ordinary form of the Breviary.

Even with the Motu Proprio, those religious orders in solemn vows are not bound by it, whether they run parishes or not. The Motu Proprio was written for the Bishops, not the Major Religious Superiors. Whereas Pius V encyclical was written for Bishops and Major Religious Superiors.

The NO Directory on the Liturgy of the Hours was written for clerics, religious and the laity. The TLM was not written with the laity in mind.

I hope this is clearer.

JR

 

[JReducation]

I am not opposed at all the religious orders using their traditional rites and calendars. What bothers me is the way certain feasts are moved around in some provinces and not others (Ascension being the prime example). Another example is the way the Archdiocese of Los Angeles erred in removing the obligation this year for attending Mass on Jan. 1.

Major universal feasts should be all be celebrated on the same day across calendars. Catholic laity should be encouraged to attend such feasts on weekdays, and maintaining the obligation does this.

Sometimes feast have to be moved for pastoral reasons or for historical reasons. Also, when a solemnity falls in sequence with a Sunday, the bishop or religious superior of a house has the ordinary athority to dispense with the obligation of the solemnity with the exception of Christmas and the founder of a religious order. Those solemnities must be celebrated, even if they fall close to a Sunday. If they fall on a Sunday the mass for Christmas or the founder of the religious order that runs the parish is celebrated. Most religious orders prefer to move it to the Monday, rather than confuse their parishioners.

As to the other holidays of obligation, it is up to the conference of bishops to decide which are major holy days in their episcopal conference. I have lived in four contries at the service of the church, as a missionary, and the liturgical calendars are different. For example, the Ascension is not a holy day of obligation outside of the United States, neither is the Immaculate Conception or the Assumption. Yet, in Puerto Rico the Epiphany on Jan 6 is a Holy Day of obligation. In Ecuador the Solemnity of St. Francis on Oct 4 is a Holy Day of Obligation, because the Franciscans run the Episcopal Conference and founded the first diocese in the country, St. Francis is the patron of the country. It is also a holy day of ogligation in Italy, where St. Francis is the patron saint, but not in the Vatican, because the Vatican is not in Italy. In the Vatican the solemnity of St. Peter and Paul is a holy day of obligation. These are due to historical events.

Then there are pastoral reasons for moving certain holy days. When you have a shortage of priests bishops will move certain holy days. There are holy days that are called moveable feasts. The bishop can move them either because he has a shortage of priests or because the conditions are such that the faithful cannot fulfill their obligation on a given day of the week.

January 1 has always been a thorn on the side of the Catholic Church. Because it is not the first day of the year for the Catholic Church. The first day of the year for the Catholic Church is the first Sunday of Advent. Through the centuries the Church has tried to place different feast days on January 1, from the circumsicion of Jesus to Mary Mother of God. It has found that they are all weak in the sense that they do not inspire the spirituality of the faithful.

It will be a while before they figure out what to do with January 1. I was stationed in Rome one year and I was surprised at how low key that day was at the Vatican. I was expecting more.

Then, as you said, exempt religious orders (not congregations or societies) have their own liturgical calendar with their own feast days and the appropriate mass and liturgy of the hours for that day. Those that adminster parishes are permitted to follow their own calendar and use their own missal and lectionary.

In fast, this past week was the feast of St. Fidelis and tomorrow is the feast of St. Catherine of Siena. If you attended mass at a Capuchin parish, it the feast of St. Fidelis followed the same form as the Sunday mass (three readins, gloria, etc). Tomorrow, if you attend mass at a Dominican parish, you will see the same mass as a Sunday. St. Catherine of Siena is a feast for the universal Church and a solemnity for the Dominicans.

I’m not sure that you are ever going to get harmony on the liturgical calendar. We haven’t even touched on the liturgical calendar of the Byzantine churches. That’s another can of worms or the liturgical calendar of ecumenical religioius orders such as the Brothers of Taize where many of the monks are Protestant, even though they follow the rule of St. Benedict and their current superior general is a Catholic. I wouldn’t want to get involved in that one and trying to figure it out.

JR

 

[PKinsale]

Well in the case of Los Angeles Jan. 1 was a Tuesday, so there should have been no change.

And there is/was no legitimate pastoral reason to move Ascension to Sunday.

 

[Jean_Anthony]

This thread is closed. Please feel free to take any side discussions to new or existing threads. Thank you all.