Saturday Vigil - Official Documentation

[michael0830]

When was the Saturday Vigil mass in the Latin rite officially
started by the Church, and what was the official reason for it? Was it for shift workers who worked Sundays? I’ve always wanted to read any official church documentation re this. Just wondering…

 

[MusicMan]

I cannot give you the official documentation for why and when it was started, however, the current Code of Canon Law (in force since 1983) allows Catholics to fulfill their Sunday obligation by attending any Mass/Divine Liturgy in any Rite on Sunday or the evening before.

At the present time, one’s reason for attending is irrelevant. All Masses/Divine Litugies that meet those parameters count as fulfilling the obligation.

 

[michael0830]

I cannot give you the official documentation for why and when it was started, however, the current Code of Canon Law (in force since 1983) allows Catholics to fulfill their Sunday obligation by attending any Mass/Divine Liturgy in any Rite on Sunday or the evening before.

At the present time, one’s reason for attending is irrelevant. All Masses/Divine Litugies that meet those parameters count as fulfilling the obligation.

So does it date back only to 1983? i thought I remember it being earlier than that. The reason I’m interested in when it was officially instituted and why dates back a few years ago when I was home schooling my kids in religious education and they posed the question, and I couldn’t answer. They and I are still initerested in some kind of official date and reasoning for the Saturday vigil. And also, is it just a U.S. thing, or is Saturday vigil practiced universally world-wide?

 

[porthos11]

So does it date back only to 1983? i thought I remember it being earlier than that. The reason I’m interested in when it was officially instituted and why dates back a few years ago when I was home schooling my kids in religious education and they posed the question, and I couldn’t answer. They and I are still initerested in some kind of official date and reasoning for the Saturday vigil. And also, is it just a U.S. thing, or is Saturday vigil practiced universally world-wide?

It’s a universal thing.

The reason for this is because the celebrations of Sundays and Solemnities begin with Evening Prayer I of the preceding day.

 

[Digitonomy]

Several years ago I heard a priest on the radio say that it was partly to accommodate some of the tourist towns, particularly in the Northeast. In those cases the church may be tiny, but heaps of Catholics may be in town for two or three months in the summer. I think the time frame he was talking about was the early to mid '60s.

However, I have never heard this reason cited again, so it seems to me at best a local reason, when there were probably bigger considerations being taken in Rome for this decision.

 

[1ke]

When was the Saturday Vigil mass in the Latin rite officially
started by the Church, and what was the official reason for it? Was it for shift workers who worked Sundays? I’ve always wanted to read any official church documentation re this. Just wondering…

The Church’s liturgy has **always **reckoned Sunday as beginning the previous evening-- see the Liturgy of the Hours.

Vigil Mass goes back to the early church. The concept is not new. Easter has always been celebrated as a Vigil, late at night. Easter Sunday is actually “the first Sunday of Easter”. Easter “happens” at the Vigil.

Recall, the Eucharistic fast used to be from midnight-- which made vigil masses as we know them impossible from a practical standpoint.

The priest and all the parishioners would have to abstain from food from midnight Friday night until the Saturday vigil at 5 or 6 p.m. That’s why the Vigils in the early church began around midnight or ensured that Eucharist was after midnight (Easter, Christmas) so that the fast requirements could be met.

In 1964 Pope Paul VI changed the Eucharistic fast requirements from midnight to one hour prior to reception. That made the addition of more vigil masses-- as we know them today-- practical.

 

[YADA]

In the early church, the catechumens were baptized to correspond with the dawn…

In fact many early baptistries were constructed such that they could throw open the doors [or windows] at the dawn.

Of course I do not think they ever eliminated any readings or prayers in order to shorten the length of the Mass that started on the everning before…and ended the next morning after the neophytes recieved their first Eucharist

 

[Chatter163]

In 1964 Pope Paul VI changed the Eucharistic fast requirements from midnight to one hour prior to reception. That made the addition of more vigil masses-- as we know them today-- practical.

Alas, this is incorrect. The eucharistic fast was changed from midnight to three hours before communion by Pope Pius XII in 1953, with his decree. *Christus Dominus. *This originally was for Sundays and holy days only.
papalencyclicals.net/Pius12/P12CHDOM.HTM

Its guidelines were extended by Pius XII in 1957 to include weekday Masses.
ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/P12FAST.HTM

The one-hour fast was established in 1966 by Pope Paul VI, at which time he also gace bishops’ conferences authority to determine rules of Friday abstinence. adoremus.org/PaulVI-Penance.html

Permission for Saturday evening anticipated Masses (a somewhat different concept from a traditional Vigil Mass) was given in different times and locations, but it was universally recognized in 1967 by Paul VI in number 28 of Eucharisticum Mysterium.
adoremus.org/eucharisticummysterium.html

 

[Digitonomy]

That’s a tour de force by Chatter163. Here is an article which gives a broader overview:

blessedsacrament.com/theology/emmanuel/huels.html

 

[Cristiano]

The Church’s liturgy has **always **reckoned Sunday as beginning the previous evening-- see the Liturgy of the Hours.

Vigil Mass goes back to the early church. The concept is not new. Easter has always been celebrated as a Vigil, late at night. Easter Sunday is actually “the first Sunday of Easter”. Easter “happens” at the Vigil.

Recall, the Eucharistic fast used to be from midnight-- which made vigil masses as we know them impossible from a practical standpoint.

The priest and all the parishioners would have to abstain from food from midnight Friday night until the Saturday vigil at 5 or 6 p.m. That’s why the Vigils in the early church began around midnight or ensured that Eucharist was after midnight (Easter, Christmas) so that the fast requirements could be met.

In 1964 Pope Paul VI changed the Eucharistic fast requirements from midnight to one hour prior to reception. That made the addition of more vigil masses-- as we know them today-- practical.

If I remember correctly during the period of the Vatican states the “converted” people from the Jewish ghetto in Rome would attend the Saturday (Sabbato in the Roman dialect of the time) evening. I also understand that they would do that because they were forced to attend Mass and in order to keep their Jewish heritage they would go to the vigil Mass.

I remember an episode that happened when I was a young boy. Some adults were commenting about a person going to the vigil Mass and one of them asked "Why do they go to that Mass? Are they Jews?’

 

[Chatter163]

I remember an episode that happened when I was a young boy. Some adults were commenting about a person going to the vigil Mass and one of them asked "Why do they go to that Mass? Are they Jews?’