Palm Sunday - Saturday vigil mass

  • Thread starter Thread starter Cupcake143
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
Any Mass on the evening before any Sunday (including “special Sundays” like Palm Sunday or Pentecost for instance) or Holy Day of Obligation fulfills the Mass obligation. Even if it is the readings are for Saturday instead of Sunday it fulfills the obligation. What “evening” entails is up to the diocese, I think, but I think 4pm onwards is pretty common.
 
At my parish, we have started praying the LOTH. Gives a better view that Sunday has begun and Saturday has ended with First Vespers (or as Father and the Psalter referred to it as “Evening Prayer I”) of Sunday.
 
Does a Saturday mass at 5pm count for Palm Sunday??
Yes, either on Palm Sunday, or on the evening of the day preceding Palm Sunday, and since it is a solemnity, the celebration begin with the evening of the preceding day. But, even it that Mass has different readings than Palm Sunday, it fulfills the obligation.

From CIC

Can. 2
For the most part the Code does not define the rites which must be observed in celebrating liturgical actions. Therefore, liturgical laws in force until now retain their force unless one of them is contrary to the canons of the Code.
Can. 202 §1.
In law, a day is understood as a period consisting of 24 continuous hours and begins at midnight unless other provision is expressly made; a week is a period of 7 days; a month is a period of 30 days, and a year is a period of 365 days unless a month and a year are said to be taken as they are in the calendar.
Can. 1248 §1
The precept of participating in the Mass is satisfied by assistance at a Mass which is celebrated anywhere in a Catholic rite either on the holy day or on the evening of the preceding day.

Note that Vespers is in the evening of a day, and is not the beginning of the day.

Liturgy of the Hours - Chapter II: Sanctification of the Day: The Different Liturgical Hours
  1. The invitatory is placed at the beginning of the whole sequence of the day’s prayer, that is, it precedes either morning prayer or the office of readings, whichever of these liturgical rites begins the day. The invitatory psalm with its antiphon may be omitted, however, when the invitatory is the prelude to morning prayer.
Morning Prayer # 38: Celebrated as it is as the light of a new day is dawning, this hour also recalls the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the true light enlightening all people (see Jn 1:9) and “the sun of justice” (Mal 4:2), “rising from on high” (Lk 1:78). Hence, we can well understand the advice of St. Cyprian: “There should be prayer in the morning so that the resurrection of the Lord may thus be celebrated.” [4]

From: GENERAL INSTRUCTION OF THE LITURGY OF THE HOURS, Congregation for Divine Worship, 1971

I. The Liturgical Day in General
  1. Each day is made holy through the liturgical celebrations of the people of God, especially through the eucharistic sacrifice and the divine office. The liturgical day runs from midnight to midnight, but the observance of Sunday and solemnities begins with the evening of the preceding day.
From: General Norms for the Liturgical Year, 1969.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top