Passion narrative and the congregation

[Phemie]

I’ve never actually seen it done in 5 parts (although that’s just my own experience).

I think part of the problem is an absence of an official lectionary version that breaks the Passion into parts. Rome says “read it in 3 parts” but does not tell us how to divide those parts. In addition, the old Sacramentary simply said to divide the reading into parts, but without specifying a number (if memory serves—all but one of my old Sacramentaries has been consigned to oblivion) and offering not even the slightest guidance on the “how,” save that the voice of Christ is reserved to the priest.

Until P.S. was issued, there really was no guidance on how to do it.

My conclusion: absent any clear instructions, people just did whatever they thought was best (resulting in a mixture of good and bad ideas).

I’m with Phemie in that I think it’s done from a misguided interpretation of “active participation.”

The message can be powerful and meaningful. When the congregation calls out “crucify Him” or “we have no king but Caesar” it truly does convey the message that Christ died on account of our own lawlessness, yes “ours” too. It works, there’s no denying it. However, just because it works doesn’t make it in conformity with the rubrics.

The US Lectionary doesn’t have both the read-through version and the parts version?? That’s odd. Ours has had both since 1992 when our previous Lectionary was published.

The previous one had 5 parts and if the part with “crucify him!” was given to the congregation it left a reader up front with 3 or 4 lines to read. I remember one reader being extremely upset because he was assigned that part two years in a row. It took it as a judgment of his reading abilities, which was the least of my considerations when assigning that particular part to anyone.

 

[Wesrock]

I am part of a very large and active parish, but unfortunately we only have one priest and no deacons. We had a lay narrator, the priest speaking for Jesus, and a lay speaker who took up individual voices. The congregation took the unsoecified, chorus voices.

 

[1Lord1Faith]

No. Not true.

Just because the publishers decide to deviate from the Church’s norms does not mean that those norms are no longer binding. It does mean that the publisher is doing something that it should not be doing.

The document does have the force of law.

What OCP prints is not legitimate.

What are the implications of OCP, lead by an Archbishop, deviating from Rome for so long. Are there any? Other than the congregation not falling asleep on Sunday evening, or morning.

Please tell me this isn’t just ‘my document is better than yours’.

My church had the priest as Jesus, a deacon narrating, a deacon for Peter, the congregation as the crowd. Right now our parish has 3 priests and 4 deacons.

 

[John_Lilburne]

In the book Documents on the Liturgy 1963-1979 is has on page 905 the Sacred Congregation of Rites decree Plures locorum of 25 March 1965. It has “Many local Ordinaries, in view of the difficulty of having three deacons or three priests to read the gospel of the Lord’s passion …”. The solution was: “layperson may read the gospel of the Lord’s passion, but they are to wear liturgical garb.”

So there were three readers of the Gospel in 1965.

There seems to be liturgical book I was not aware of before today. It is listed among other liturgical books in the 2001 Instruction Liturgiam Authenticam, n. 110: the Passio Domini Nostri Iesu Christi, which was published in 1989.

There seems to have been an earlier version, which I found from the Mannix library catalogue:
Cantus passionis Domini Nostri Jesu Christi secundum Matthaeum, Marcum, Lucam et Joannem, SS. D. N. Benedicti XV Pontificis Maximi jussu restitutus et editus.
Publication Date* 1917
Call Number* 238.17 PAS
Collection* OMI Seminary Library

So I suspect this is where the three readers comes from. A sung version of the Passion in parts.

The 2010 Roman Missal (translated from the 2008 Latin edition) has for Palm Sunday “21. … It is read by a Deacon or, if there is no Deacon, by a Priest. It may also be read by readers, with the part of Christ, if possible, reserved to a Priest.”

So the Roman Missal does not have the what the 1988 PASCHALIS SOLLEMNITATIS document had: “It should be sung or read in the traditional way, that is, by three persons who take the parts of Christ, the narrator and the people.”

In Australia the Lectionary approved on 12 June 1981 has four parts.

I have made a video about this question, which is at youtube.com/watch?v=epJ0PyeViK8 . It is just under two minutes.

 

[Phemie]

This obviously is not a binding document, as the Breaking Bread Hymnal, which has been used by our parish and hundreds of other parish throughout the US and is an approved hymnal has the Passion Narrative for Palm Sunday divided into 5 parts and has done so for years. This is not something new or unusual.

The fact that many on CAF don’t like OCP has no bearing on the fact that this is how the Passion Narrative is printed and it is perfectly legitimate.

The thing with “approved” is that not everything that is “approved” by some entity is following Rome’s rules.

I have in my possession a book of Sunday celebrations without a priest that was published in the ‘80s by a regional Bishops’ Conference. It states that it’s more important to come together as a parish for a Sunday Celebration of the Word without a priest than to attend an easily accessible Mass in another parish. Say what???

In my previous parish they were still taking that to heart as people would routinely drive by several churches to attend a Sunday Celebration of the Word rather than stop at one of those churches and attend Mass. All because the Sunday Celebration of the Word was in French and Mass was in English in those parishes. Note that those people were all well versed in English and pretty much worked in that language all week.

 

[FrDavid96]

What are the implications of OCP, lead by an Archbishop, deviating from Rome for so long. Are there any? Other than the congregation not falling asleep on Sunday evening, or morning.

Please tell me this isn’t just ‘my document is better than yours’.

My church had the priest as Jesus, a deacon narrating, a deacon for Peter, the congregation as the crowd. Right now our parish has 3 priests and 4 deacons.

No, this is not “my document is better than yours” because there is no comparison to be made.

One needs to understand how church liturgical laws/norms actually work.

Missalettes do not have any authority. They can only quote what the Church has already said. The publishers have no authority to make any changes (none, zero, zip, zilch).

On the other hand, Paschalis Solemnitatis does have authority. It is binding. It is a binding document issued by the highest authority of the Church (in this matter), the Congregation for Divine Worship.

What your parish did (as you describe it at the end of your post) sounds like the same thing I did myself (which I also posted)—which is an indication that I don’t take issue with that.

My purpose for this post is to explain that what we read in missalettes is not binding and certainly does not “overturn” what the Congregation for Divine Worship issues as binding on the Church.

Personally, I’d like more clarity and more specifics about how this should be done. Absent that clarity, we’re going to see local adaptations.

 

[FrDavid96]

Dividing into 5 parts is not an option. The Passion is to be proclaimed in the manner described in P.S. (already quoted).

I can see how this statement can be misinterpreted because of my own lack of clarity.

When I wrote “not an option” what I meant is that the Lectionary does not say:

Option A: Read by a deacon as at other Masses.
Option B: [whatever]
Option C: Read in 5 parts.
Option D: [whatever]

I did not intend to say that it would be wrong to do it that way; only that it’s not a specified option. It was intended as a direct answer to the earlier question that I bolded.

 

[1Lord1Faith]

The thing with “approved” is that not everything that is “approved” by some entity is following Rome’s rules.

I have in my possession a book of Sunday celebrations without a priest that was published in the ‘80s by a regional Bishops’ Conference. It states that it’s more important to come together as a parish for a Sunday Celebration of the Word without a priest than to attend an easily accessible Mass in another parish. Say what???

In my previous parish they were still taking that to heart as people would routinely drive by several churches to attend a Sunday Celebration of the Word rather than stop at one of those churches and attend Mass. All because the Sunday Celebration of the Word was in French and Mass was in English in those parishes. Note that those people were all well versed in English and pretty much worked in that language all week.

Can you tell me how bishops have been able to deviate from Rome? How is this possible? They are bishops, they must know what they are doing. Is it taken by Rome to be part of decentralization?

 

[Phemie]

Can you tell me how bishops have been able to deviate from Rome? How is this possible? They are bishops, they must know what they are doing. Is it taken by Rome to be part of decentralization?

I think if I had the answer to that I’d be a millionaire. We all want to know that.