P
ProVobis
Guest
Well, then, maybe it wasn’t the Holy Spirit then. DUH!I’m sorry, i was taught that the Holy Spirit didn’t make mistakes. But I guess i have been wrong all along
Pope to Reintroduce Latin into the Novus Ordo and Move the "Sign of Peace"
- Status
P
PatienceAndLove
Guest
If the Holy Spirit deems it appropriate for changes to occur, it will happen.
Until then, yes we can hope and pray, but until it happens, maybe all this supposing and such is not necessary.
Until then, yes we can hope and pray, but until it happens, maybe all this supposing and such is not necessary.
P
ProVobis
Guest
Good point. However, when we learn a language, we’re always taught to translate one word then the next word. There’s your problem. We have to think in Latin sentence structure. That means modifier following noun. Start with doing it with the English like,I think that if English is your first language you will probably still “think” the words in your head in English even as you hear and understand them in Latin.
God my, Deus meus,
youth my, juventutem meam
Body My, Corpus Meum
You get the idea. It isn’t simply learning words but phrases and clauses. Those interlinear web sites are super.
J
JReducation
Guest
As we ponder the theology of great mystics like Mother Teresa we find our faith becomes deeper the more we seek to do God’s will. The mystics have taught us that our experience of Christ in the sacraments, especially in the Eucharist, is only as deep as our life of contemplation outside of the liturgy.
Someone like Mother Teresa who lived in both eras, the pre-Vatican II and the post-Vatican II era, didn’t have difficulties encountering Christ in the Eucharist, even if there were changes in the liturgy that she didn’t like or understand. There is a reason why she didn’t encounter such difficulties and a lesson to be learned from her.
She worked out a mystical theology for her that was based on Scripture and the spirituality of other great saints. Her favourites were our Holy Father Francis and St. Benedict. In her reflections of the Gospel through the eyes of Francis she found that a literal imitation of Christ’s actions brought her into closer union with her beloved. She became more like him. As she became more like him, she also saw things through his eyes, not her own. Francis taught her to see live, the Church and even the Eucharist as Christ sees it, from the inside out. Most of us look at it from the outside in. But real faith is the other way around. Real faith seeks to see things through the eyes of the beloved.
The only way that the mystic can see through they eyes of the beloved is to spend time with the beloved in silence and solitude. This is where Benedict entered into Mother’s theology. It was Benedict’s sons who introduced what we later called Gregorian chant. The reasons why it was called Gregorian are irrelevant. The reason why they introduced it is very relevant to this conversation.
The monks learned from Benedict. They learned to spend time in silence. He taught them to get away from the world, even from the daily activities of the Church, without leaving the Church or the world. This was not a message for religious alone. This was for all Christians. You can only find Christ in silence and solitude. You will not see the face of Christ and hear his voice if you are paying too much attention to every thing that is happening around you, whether it is connected with the Church, the secular world or even the family.
This is why our Holy Father Francis founded the first secular order in the history of the Church. People wanted to find Christ in the liturgy and in prayer. Many thought that the liturgy and the prayer of the Church had to change. Others thought that they had to become monks or friars. Francis’ realized that what people needed was to get into a routine of prayer, penance, detachment from the world, detachment from material possessions, attachment to works of charity, obedience to the Church, humility and when you believed you were right, but authority said differently and the endurance to embrace all kinds of suffering.
So he founded this secular order for the average person who has a family or is single or a secular priest, but for whatever reason he or she cannot enter a friary or a monastery. They could embrace this way of life. Today, over one million men and women vow and promise to live this life and they are truly happy. When they approach the liturgy, they can approach it in peace and with deep love. Whether someone shakes hands at the sign of peace or there is a female alter server or the liturgy is in the EF form, it does not get in the way of their encounter with Christ. It is barely noticeable.
Like Mother Teresa learned from Benedict and our Holy Father Francis, the depth of our spiritual life before we come to the Eucharist will enhance our awareness of Christ in the Eucharist so that we can enter into a state of union with the Divine where the human cannot penetrate.
We are called to live deeper lives of faith. But it does not begin at the Eucharist. It reaches its climax at the Eucharist. It begins with our individual conversion. Benedict always said that we should not worry about going to Heaven. We should focus on doing what is virtuous. Francis always taught his secular followers that Heaven was a gift that God would grant us. Our role was to embrace Christ’s cross. If we became too focussed on Heaven we could risk failing in humility. To focus on the prize without running the race was full-hearty. The race is about prayer, penance, detachment, obedience, humility, silence, solitude and great love through simple gestures. No one in our time has captured the mystery of the Eucharist better than Mother Teresa. You don’t have to be a religious to live this way. As I said, Francis founded a community of secular men and women 800 years ago who still lives this way. They are not confounded by the difficulties in the Church or the world. They manage to remain detached from the difficulties, while attached to the faith and to Christ in the Eucharist.
We need to take these examples to heart.
JR
D
Dauphin
Guest
Often, God permits evil to draw from it a greater good.
B
BSHoop96
Guest
Be careful…this could be said TO the people that don’t like the NO just as easily.
P
ProVobis
Guest
That is true for natural disasters too.
B
BSHoop96
Guest
Gosh, I’m sure you didn’t mean to imply that either form of the Mass was evil?
D
Dauphin
Guest
Of course not.Gosh, I’m sure you didn’t mean to imply that either form of the Mass was evil?
S
SenorSalsa
Guest
Im not saying all the changes were right, but my point was the NO was changed, and was a right change. Stuff done “in the spirit of vii” could be undone, but the NO should be here to stay, until it is changed again
i hope this is sarcasm. Its a tough artform over the internet
I hope you dont mean that God let the Church get corrupted, even temporarily, so that we could “learn a lesson”. Need I direct you to the quote about the gates of Hell never prevailing against the Church?
K
kitkatty
Guest
The exaggerations you describe always reminds me of stopping the Mass to have a meet and greet time. Maybe because growing up Byzantine I was never used to this sudden rush around the Church right before communion to accost everyone within reach, however to be charitable and be a participant of the liturgy I try to greet those seated closely to me. I was very relieved when the priest put a stop to those who were running around frantically trying to see how many they could shake hands with in a certain amount of time. It seems more dignified and reverent now that people can`t run up and down the aisles.
K
kitkatty
Guest
Senor, of course the gates of Hell will never PREVAIL against the Church but that doesn
t mean we dont have human error also. That is the mysterious paradox of the Bride of Christ. All you have to do is look at 2,000 years of Church history.
J
Jeanette_L
Guest
JR, I cropped your post to emphasize some of the portions that just jump off the page at me.As we ponder the theology of great mystics like Mother Teresa we find our faith becomes deeper the more we seek to do God’s will. The mystics have taught us that our experience of Christ in the sacraments, especially in the Eucharist, is only as deep as our life of contemplation outside of the liturgy…
…You will not see the face of Christ and hear his voice if you are paying too much attention to every thing that is happening around you, whether it is connected with the Church, the secular world or even the family…
…When they approach the liturgy, they can approach it in peace and with deep love. Whether someone shakes hands at the sign of peace or there is a female alter server or the liturgy is in the EF form, it does not get in the way of their encounter with Christ. It is barely noticeable…
…Like Mother Teresa learned from Benedict and our Holy Father Francis, the depth of our spiritual life before we come to the Eucharist will enhance our awareness of Christ in the Eucharist so that we can enter into a state of union with the Divine where the human cannot penetrate…
…We are called to live deeper lives of faith. But it does not begin at the Eucharist. It reaches its climax at the Eucharist. It begins with our individual conversion. We need to take these examples to heart…
JR
It seems that if a person is so consumed with just being with Christ, if they are focused on being like him - as they live their lives from their rising to their going to bed at night, they will not be consumed with all these other things. How could they be, being in love with Christ in the Eucharist is all that will ultimately matter. And holiness will follow, it can’t help but do so. It is in the heart where the rubber meets the road, it is really where the life of Christ is manifested in us.
Sometimes it seems to me that all this other fussing is more a distraction or even a diversion, to keep people from focusing on what is the true spiritual life, inner conversion of their hearts, that deep place that is prepared for the encounter with Christ in the Eucharist.
B
BSHoop96
Guest
I believe this was exactly what was intended!
M
mullenpm
Guest
I thank those on this forum who responded to my question, but I do not understand the fuss about the Latin Mass. And, what is the “New Mass”? I have never heard of it and I do notice that people who attend churches where they have this type of service do not call themselves, Catholic. They say they are NO. What kind of religion is that?
I grew up in the Catholic Church; may I say the Roman Catholic Church. At Mass we used a Missal and the Latin was on one side of the page and English on the opposite page. I wonder how many people at Mass in those days actually read the Mass in Latin.
Of course, we studied Latin in Catholic Grade School (now called Elementary School); we memorized the Latin hymns and prayers. To this day, I still know many prayers in Latin.
So why are so many people becoming so upset and argumentative about whether or not the prayers of the Mass are said in Latin or English. Just buy a missal that has both; I am sure they are available.
I watch Daily Mass on EWTN and the priests use Latin and English during the Mass and it is beautiful.
Also, I find it hard to believe one commentor who said that the Catholic churches on the West Coast would never use a Latin Mass because priests there do not know Latin. I don’t believe that for a minute.
I grew up in the Catholic Church; may I say the Roman Catholic Church. At Mass we used a Missal and the Latin was on one side of the page and English on the opposite page. I wonder how many people at Mass in those days actually read the Mass in Latin.
Of course, we studied Latin in Catholic Grade School (now called Elementary School); we memorized the Latin hymns and prayers. To this day, I still know many prayers in Latin.
So why are so many people becoming so upset and argumentative about whether or not the prayers of the Mass are said in Latin or English. Just buy a missal that has both; I am sure they are available.
I watch Daily Mass on EWTN and the priests use Latin and English during the Mass and it is beautiful.
Also, I find it hard to believe one commentor who said that the Catholic churches on the West Coast would never use a Latin Mass because priests there do not know Latin. I don’t believe that for a minute.
J
JReducation
Guest
Terms like NO and New Mass are more common on CAF than they are on the street. I used those terms with the superior of our friars in my parish, who happens to be a theologian and he blinked as if I were speaking another language.
When Pope Paul approved the changes in the mass during the 1960s the guidelines were published in Latin and the heading said Novus Ordo (NO) which means New Order. It was referring to the new order of celebrating the mass. Some people call it the New Mass.
There are also Eastern Catholics who celebrate mass using a different form and different languages. But they are still Catholic and their mass is the same mass as the one that Jesus celebrated at the Last Supper. It looks very different from that mass and from our mass, but as long as it is the mass approved by the Catholic Church, it remains THE mass.
The mass has been the same mass from the day that it was instituted at the Last Supper. The form of the mass has changed over the centuries. But the mass is the same. It still consists of two essential parts: the proclamation of the Word of God and the Offering of the Eucharistic Sacrifiece with communion. The communion of the faithful was added after the Middle Ages. Until then the faithful could only go to communion several times a year, not daily as we do today. The priest was the only person who could receive communion daily. Even religious in monasteries could not receive communion daily.
As to the Latin mass issue, the problem is that there is a group of Catholics who believe that the only proper way to celebrate the mass is in Latin. This is obviously not correct. Latin is the official language of the Church and the mass, but it is not mandatory. Those who would like to see it as mandatory continue to insist that mass in the language of the people is less reverent, even though popes and bishops have declared that this is not the case.
There are some who prefer to believe what the popes say, when the pope says that it is not irreverant to celebrate the mass in the language of the people. However, the popes have never denied that Latin is the official language of the mass.
Those Catholics who say they are NO, TLM or EF are like politicians who say they are Republican or Democrats, rather than say they are Americans or Citizens of the United States. In other words, they are creating divisions where there should be none. Whether the mass is celebrated in Latin or English, in the form that was used before Vatican II or in the form approved by Paul VI, it is still the Catholic mass.
The study of Latin has become an elective in most colleges of theology. That’s why many young deacons, priests, bishops, religious and theologians don’t speak it. It is not a required course in many colleges.
When I studied theology Latin and Greek were required if you were majoring in Church Law, Sacred Scripture, or Mystical Theology. In all of the other areas of theology it was an elective.
What the young friars at EWTN do is that they read it out of the Sacramentary (Missal). They actually don’t speak the language. But they learn to pronounce it. Since they know the prayers in English, they know what they’re saying. They wouldn’t be able to hold a conversation in Latin, but that’s not needed, because the number of prayers that they say in Latin are not so long. Eventually, you read it so many times that you memorize it.
If a priest had to celebrate the entire mass in Latin from memory, that would be more of a challenge, because most have never studied the language. They would have to take some courses in it. There are some priests and deacons taking courses in the Latin language.
They do the same thing in Latin as they do when they learn Spanish or Creole. They read it from the book, eventually they memorize it.
Hope this helps.
JR
S
scapularkid8
Guest
I would have to third that opinion!Amen to that from another youngin.
M
mullenpm
Guest
JReducation - thank you so much for your detailed and understandable answer. I am relieved to be in the company of a superior of the friars in your parish.
K
Kirsty33
Guest
From another “youngin”- I completely aggree.
If our Holy Father decides to move the sign of peace it’s obviously with good reason and after much thought and prayer (directed by the Holy Spirit).As for the consecration being in Latin- I couldn’t think of anything better- it makes one take more notice of the most sacred moment of the Mass and makes it more universal- the very definition of Catholic.
- Status