A Short History of the Roman Mass

Book Review:
A Short History of the Roman Mass (Paperback)
by Michael Davies (Author)
List Price:
$2.50
Amazon Price:
$2.50

Paperback: 50 pages
Publisher: T A N Books & Publishers (March 1997)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0895555468
ISBN-13: 978-0895555465

***** / *****
Summary:

There are five essential elements to the Christian Eucharistic Sacrifice:
1. Bread and wine brought to the altar.
2. The celebrant gives thanks.
3. He blesses the bread and says the words of Consecration.
4. He does the same with the wine.
5. The Consecrated Bread, now the Body of Christ, is broken and distributed among the people, and the Contents of the Chalice is likewise distributed.

Development of Rituals

Over time, things that were done for practical purposes became established customs, and these actions became ritualized. For example, the Lavabo, where the priest washed his hands was present in all developed rites of the Mass. No established prayers were prescribed in the beginning, but it became the practice that Psalm25 was appropriate, “Lavabo inter innocents manus meas?” (I shall wash my hands among the innocent). The only ritual actions in the first two centuries were posture, kneeling or standing, as well as the “kiss of peace” which were all inherited from the Jews. The general outline of the service would take form, since things which are repeated many times are often repeated in much the same way. Early on the people would participate by responding when it was appropriate; Amen, Thanks be to God, Lord have mercy, etc. During the persecution, formulas were shorter for obvious reasons, but when the persecution ended and Constantine allowed the practice of Christianity and later the established religion of the Empire by Theodosius I(379-395), this had a great impact on the ritual. From the 4th century, complete liturgical texts were compiled, and the Sacramentary and the Euchalogion were formulated. The Euchalogion contained the essential parts of the Missal, Pontifical, and Rituale in the Roman Rite. All ancient liturgies are derived from 4 parent rites, 3 of which are of the 3 old patriarchates: Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch. The 4th rite is the Gallican Rite. The Gallican Rite had influence in the development of the finalized Roman Rite. Until the 8th century, even though the Bishop of Rome was the patriarch of the entire West, the Roman Rite was the local rite of the city of Rome only. All these Western Rites (Latin but not Roman) was called Gallican. After the 8th century, the Roman Rite began to spread. The Mozarabic rite was driven back by the Roman rite, and in Milan where there existed the Ambrosian rite, the people took up arms to resist the imposition of the Roman rite. Back to the ritual itself, the practice of reading until the bishop said to stop, gave way to a more planned structure of readings, a fixed amount of readings at each Mass. Some books which emerged were the liturgical Gospel book (evangelarium), the Epistle-book (epistolarium), and then the complete Lectionary (lectionarium). The older structure did not have it the way we have it today in the 1962 Missal, it did not have the Mass as a whole in mind, but in the service of its user. One book contained all that the bishop and priest needed, the deacon had his book (diakonikon), the choir had theirs (liber antiphonarius or gradualis, the liber responsalis and the psalterium; later on we had the hymnarium, liber sequentialis, troponarius, etc.), and so on. The bishop had the Sacramentary (Sacramentarium or liber sacramentorum). The core of the Canon of the Mass was already in place by the 4th century. The original Roman liturgies was originally in Greek, but was gradually replaced with Latin around the 3rd or 4th centuries. The reform of the Roman liturgy by St. Gregory the Great, who became pope in 590, was a great time for the liturgy; he simplified the rite that was already in place, and gave it more order. Except for a few minor changes and amplifications, the Mass we have today in the 1962 Missal, the Mass of Pius V (1570), is pretty much the same. St. Gregory was the last person to touch the most essential part of the Mass, the Canon of the Mass, according to Benedict XIV (1740-1758). After the introduction of Low Masses in the 9th century, the 10th century saw the implementation of the complete or perfect Missal (Missale plenarium), and by the 13th century onwards, one no longer heard of the Sacramentary. The Missal of Pius V, promulgated by papal Bull, Quo Primum Tempore (1570), was a restoration (not a creation) of the existing rite. It was an act not only of the pope, but truly, an act of the Council of Trent. So the real title of the Mass of Pius V is, “Missale Romanum ex decreto sacrosancti Concilii Tridentini restitutem – “The Roman Missal Restored According to the Decrees of the Holy Council of Trent”. This was not a “new Mass”, a “Novus Ordo Missae”, as the Mass of Paul VI is.

Timeline

52-55 AD – Account of the Eucharist by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:23-27
1st and 2nd centuries – There was not an absolutely unified liturgy.
2nd century – A Roman pagan, C. Plinius Caecilius, c. 62-113, wrote about the early liturgy: That on a certain day, Christians gather before daybreak, and sing alternately hymns, and bound themselves by an oath (sacramento), and would gather again later on to share a meal, of “harmless food”.
4th century – liturgical books used. Until this century, the only known book used was the Bible, where the lessons were read from. Psalms and the Lord’s prayer were known by heart, and other prayers were extemporaneous.
7th century – earliest surviving texts of the liturgy.
8th century – Roman rite began to spread outside of Rome.
9th century – musical notation was used in the West. The Low Mass was developed as a response to the multiplication of Masses that occurred, where priests would say several Masses a day. This led to the compilation of the Missal.
10th century – The use of the Perfect Missal (Missale plenarium) was developed.
11th century – The Mozarabic rite, still in use today in Toledo Spain, was driven back by the Roman rite.

Review: This was an excellent book. I really enjoyed reading this book. For such a small work, I was amazed at how informative it was.

Highly recommended.

AMDG
Laurence Gonzaga
President
Una Voce San Bernardino

Fatima: A Message More Urgent Than Ever

Book Review:
Fatima: A Message More Urgent Than Ever
By Luiz Sérgio Solimeo
$8.95
Order from TFP Website

***** / *****

This was an excellent summary of the story of the Fatima apparitions. I have heard much about the basic story of OL Fatima, but I never really knew the minute details of what took place, let alone a chronological exposition of what happened. I have read the work of Luiz Sergio Solimeo before, and he has always impressed me with his ability to treat theological and historical matters very succinctly and yet very profoundly in his writing for the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family, and Property. I have had the pleasure of meeting him at the TFP headquarters in Spring Grove, Pennsylvania, 2 years ago, and the honor of sitting down with him for 2 hours at the final banquet dinner, discussing theological matters, Vatican II, the Latin Mass, and the Novus Ordo Missae. Last year, he gave us a lesson at the TFP Student Action Conference on Freedom according to the mind of St. Thomas Aquinas. It was the closest thing I have gotten so far to a seminary lesson.

There are many interesting facts in this book that I didn’t know. There are even some points in contrast with some other Fatima scholars, even those I have work with or have been in contact with like Robert Sungenis and Gerry Matatics. There's an apostolate out there by Fr. Nicholas Gruner whose mission is to try to get our pope to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This was a request by Our Lady Herself at Fatima, which the popes of the day and subsequently failed to do. Turns out, based on the points raised in this book, it is too late to fulfill Our Lady's request. The Consecration was to have been done in the 30's to avoid the Second World War. Since Pius XI failed to Consecrate Russia, the Second World War took place. However, this does not mean the message of Fatima is no longer relevant. Indeed, the message makes it pretty clear, that even though we cannot avoid WWII, since it already happened, the message speaks of the chastisement that we all have to suffer through prior to the consecration of Russia to the IHM in the way Our Lady prescribed, and then the Triumph of the IHM will come. The fight must still continue, however, since as promised, since the consecration has not yet taken place, “the errors of Russia” have spread far and wide throughout the world. Perhaps not always under the brand of “Communism”, but the principles of unconditional egalitarianism and moral relativism have clearly saturated the landscape of supposed enemies of Communism, such as the US.

This is an incredibly easy read. I enjoyed it very much.

AMDG,
Laurence Gonzaga
President
Una Voce San Bernardino