Why was the Calander Changed?

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Just a simple question I was wondering about; Why was the Calander of Saints changed?
 
With the old calendar there were one or more saints to be celebrated each day. The mass of the day was seldom celebrated. [As I recall the mass of the day was usually that of the preceeding Sunday except in Lent.] [Any mass for one who had died was said as the requiem mass; so that was usually the mass one encountered each day.]

Masses were developed for each day of the year in the new calendar. It was necessary to radically trim the number of saints in order that the mass of the day would be said most days.

Further it was desired to add a number of the more recently canonized, and better known, saints to the calendar.

To accomplish this a large number of lesser known saints from earlier times were removed from the universal calendar, though some were retained on various local calendars where they were especially venerated. [And masses for those who had died were said as mass of the day.]
 
Ok, I think I kind of understand, but what do you mean by “Mass of the Day”? Are Masses said in honor of Saints different readings or something than the normal “Mass of that day”?
 
In the new Missal, the lectionary is separated from the Missal itself. This way, even if you celebrate the memorial of a saint where the saint is mentioned in the orations, you can still have the continual scripture readings from the lectionary. In the old Missal, the scripture readings is part of the Missal, which means that every time you celebrate the memorial of a saint, the readings are also chosen specifically for that saint (in the new Missal, this is only done on feasts and sollemnities). And there are no special readings for weekdays in the old Missal. If you celebrate the Mass of the day during the week, all the orations and readings are the same as the preceding Sunday.
 
Rawb said:
Just a simple question I was wondering about; Why was the Calander of Saints changed?
Click to expand...
I’ve possibly left out somethings but here are at least some of the reasons.
  1. In some cases, to align certain parts better for e.g. the Queenship moved to the 8th day of the Assumption to link it with he Assumption. Or moving the Vistation so that it comes before the Nativity of St. John the Baptist
  2. Reduction of particular feasts of orders that were included in the Universal calendar - e.g. the Stigmata of St. Francis. Also included in this was initially the reduction of some of the titles of the BVM, e.g. OL Random/Mercy on the 24th September, and secondary feasts of Christ. some of the more unfortunate omissions included the Holy Name of Jesus (restored in 2002) and the Precious Blood
The Pecious Blood was deemed as a relic of the Passion feasts- feasts such as the Holy Lance and the Five Wounds which were assigned to the Fridays in Lent. In 1913, most dioceses dropped them according to the new insistence on observing the ferial Office and in 1962, the feasts that remained were removed from the appendix to the missal. Pity that the Concilium saw fit to remove the Precious Blood, particulrly since the devotin was coming into its own with teh approval of John XXIII
  1. Transference or omission of saints from the Lenten period as far as was possible, and from the ‘O’ antiphon days. For example, St. Thomas being shifted to July 1 or St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Gregory to January 28 and September 3 respectively.
  2. Trying to fit certain saints on their death or more correctly their “heavenly birth”. There are quite a few incocnsistencies tho
  3. The Critical method: that is, elimination of of saints whose lives did not meet the criteria of the Concilium. This resulted in the omission of quite a few of the early martyrs, though some were retained for various reasons. Many were omitted however, and included under the general title of “Early Martyrs of Rome”
  4. Importance: the original criteria was saints of “universal improtance” but even that is not really possible so the Concilium spoke of saints of “greater importance” In line with this “universal” thing, a small policy of de-Romanisation was followed. Out of around 38-40 Popes only around 15 remain.
Likewise a number of Italian saints were removed for “balance”. The idea behind this (which also was found in the original calendar of St. Pius V an the proposed one of Benedict XV - which were however not un-Roman) was an equal number of saints more or less geographically- at that time thoguh, it was still more or less the countries of Europe. The NO calendar has taken this a bit further and thus also there was the addition of the Japanese martyrs, the Ugandian martyrs and martyrs from the USA, Canda, Australia and NZ, South America.

From the religious orders’ saints and feasts, those that “made the cut” were founders, missionaires to certain parts of the world (which ties in also with the previous idea about martyrs) or those who “emphasized some special aspect of religious life”. The others were left on the particular calendars of their order. So for example St. Paschal Baylon, St. Didacus and St. Jospeh of Cupertino now only appear on the Franciscan calendar
  1. Not really a criteria for omission but one of the ideas behind the new calendar was that all classes and states be represented, so they chose a few saints from each “type”
  2. Over all these, there was the idea of the sanctorale being secondary to the temproale. This also influecned the amalgamation of certain saints who formerly had their own feast days- the Holy Archangels (St. Grabriel and St. Raphael were introduced in the calendar only in the 20th century- but rather than remove them, they were amalgamated with the older feast of St. Michael) , Ss. Joachim and Anna
 
Rawb said:
Just a simple question I was wondering about; Why was the Calander of Saints changed?
Click to expand...
  1. In some cases, to align certain parts better for e.g. the Queenship moved to the 8th day of the Assumption to link it with the Assumption. Or moving the Vistation so that it comes before the Nativity of St. John the Baptist
  2. Reduction of particular feasts of orders that were included in the Universal calendar - e.g. the Stigmata of St. Francis. Also included in this was initially the reduction of some of the titles of the BVM, e.g. OL Random/Mercy on the 24th September, and secondary feasts of Christ. some of the more unfortunate omissions included the Holy Name of Jesus (restored in 2002) and the Precious Blood
The Pecious Blood was deemed as a relic of the Passion feasts- feasts such as the Holy Lance and the Five Wounds which were assigned to the Fridays in Lent. In 1913, most dioceses dropped them according to the new insistence on observing the ferial Office and in 1962, the feasts that remained were removed form the appendix to the missal. Pity that the Concilium saw fit to remove the Precious Blood, particulrly since the devotin was coming into its own with the approval of John XXIII
  1. Transference or omission of saints from the Lenten period as far as was possible, and from the ‘O’ antiphon days. For example, St. Thomas being shifted to July 1 or St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Gregory to January 28 and September 3 respectively.
  2. Trying to fit certain saints on their death or more correctly their “heavenly birth”. There are quite a few inconsistencies though
  3. The Critical method: that is, elimination of saints whose lives did not meet the criteria of the Concilium. This resulted in the omission of quite a few of the early martyrs, though some were retained for various reasons. Many were omitted however, and included under the general title of “Early Martyrs of Rome”
  4. Importance: the original criteria was saints of “universal improtance” but even that is not really possible so the Concilium spoke of saints of “greater importance” In line with this “universal” thing, a small policy of de-Romanisation was followed. Out of around 38-40 Popes only around 15 remain.
Likewise a number of Italian saints were removed for “balance”. The idea behind this (which also was found in the original calendar of St. Pius V an the proposed one of Benedict XV - which were however not un-Roman) was an equal number of saints more or less geographically- at that time thoguh, it was still more or less the countries of Europe. The NO calendar has taken this a bit further and thus also there was the addition of the Japanese martyrs, the Ugandian martyrs and martyrs from the USA, Canda, Australia and NZ, South America.

From the religious orders’ saints and feasts, those that “made the cut” were founders, missionaries to certain parts of the world (which ties in also with the previous idea about martyrs) or those who “emphasized some special aspect of religious life”. The others were left on the particular calendars of their order. For example St. Paschal Baylon, St. Joseph Cupertino and St. Didacus were removed from the Universal calendar and left on the Franciscan Calendar
  1. Not really a criteria for omission but one of the ideas behind the new calendar was that all classes and states be represented and so there was few saints from each “type”
  2. A preference for the temporale (i.e. seasonal and Sunday cycle) over the sanctorale-which also influenced a lot of the things mentioned previously. This lead to many saints being amalgamated such as the Holy Archangels -Michael, Gabriel and Raphael (Ss. Gabriel and Raphael were added to the universal calendar in the 20th century but rather than omit them, they were added to the older feast of St. Michael) . Another example is Ss. Joachim and Anna
 
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