Rome, Italy, Jun 1, 2017 / 03:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Ten years after Benedict XVI broadened access to the celebration of the Traditional Latin Mass, the document by which he did so is being hailed as a means of closing the rift of division following liturgical changes made after the Second Vatican Council.
“Sometimes there are these polemics, but I think Benedict tried to overcome these polemics, saying that even in the liturgy there is a certain progress … but clearly in full continuity with the tradition of the Church,” Fr. Vincenzo Nuara, OP, told CNA May 31.
Tensions were heightened after the Second Vatican Council’s reforms, and “unfortunately these situations of contrast, of opposition are created” even today, Fr. Nuara said.
In light of this situation, Benedict XVI’s 2007 motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, which widened access to the pre-Vatican II liturgy, “was not an instrument to divide” or throw further fuel on the flames, he said.
Rather, “it was an instrument to unite. To unite, and to bring again that ecclesial peace that’s needed in this time.”
“I see it as a positive instrument, not negative,” Fr. Nuara said. “It’s not an instrument for going backwards. It’s an instrument to reconnect ourselves in continuity” with different ecclesial styles.
Fr. Nuara is president of the association “Priestly Friends of Summorum Pontificum” and founder and spiritual assistant of the “Youth and Tradition” association.
He is also one of the organizers of an upcoming Sept. 14-17 pilgrimage marking the 10th anniversary of Summorum Pontificum, and spoke to journalists at a working breakfast on the event.
The motu proprio was issued July 7, 2007, and went into effect Sept. 14 of that year, the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross.
The document established that the post-Vatican II Roman Missal, first issued by Blessed Paul VI, is the ordinary form of the Roman rite, and that the prior version, last issued by St. John XXIII in 1962 and known as the Traditional Latin Mass or the Tridentine Mass, is the Roman rite’s extraordinary form.
In the motu proprio, Benedict noted that the Traditional Latin Mass was never abrogated. He awknowledged clearly the right of all priests of the Roman rite to say Mass using the Roman Missal of 1962, and established that parish priests should be willing say the extraordinary form for groups of the faithful who request it.
Benedict also established that the faithful could have recourse to their bishop or even the Vatican if their requests for celebration of the extraordinary form were not satisfied.
The provisions of Summorum Pontificum for the use of the extraordinary form replaced those of St. John Paul II laid down in Quattuor abhinc annos and Ecclesia Dei.
According to that indult, priests and faithful who wished to celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass had to get permission from their bishop to do so. It could only be for those who requested it, could not normally be said at parish churches, and the bishop could set days and conditions for its celebration.
After the Second Vatican Council, the Missal issued by Bl. Paul VI, also known as the Novus Ordo, was widely adopted. It was widely translated into vernacular languages, and is often celebrated with the priest facing toward the congregation.
However, not a few faithful continued to be attached to the earlier form of the liturgy, and Benedict’s motu proprio was considered a generous response to these faithful.
Benedict wrote in the motu proprio that the two forms “will in no way lead to a division” in the Church’s belief “for they are two usages of the one Roman rite.”
In his letter to bishops accompanying Summorum Pontificum, Benedict also noted that “the two Forms of the usage of the Roman Rite can be mutually enriching.”
Fr. Nuara reflected that since Summorum Pontificum, “those who have permission to use the ancient form of the liturgy have also at the same time rediscovered the sanctity of the new.”
This mutual enrichment is a discovery Fr. Nuara said he himself has made in his 25 years as a priest, during which he has celebrated both the new and ancient liturgical formulas.
But it is also a discovery “that many (other) priests have made.”
“Benedict is a positive man. Benedict, who reflects as a theologian and a pastor, realized that the ancient form that has grown in the history of the Church for years, can give new impetus to the new form,” he said.
The Mass “is the bridge where they meet, because the Eucharist is the point of encounter … the sacrament of unity,” Fr. Nuara said, adding that what “must be avoided” is that people “take advantage of their particular trend or attention to one or the other liturgy, to create fences of division and separation.”
Benedict himself celebrated the new form of the liturgy “with great dignity,” but before his election as Bishop of Rome was also known to celebrate the ancient liturgy with the same esteem.
What Summorum Pontificum seeks to do, then, is to work for this unity, he said, adding that at 10 years since its publication, his hope is that people from both sides will work toward this goal.
“We want to send, to communicate this message,” he said. “Because the Church is a family, the family of God.”
When the Summorum Pontificum Pilgrimage takes place in September, it will be a privileged time to show this unity, he said.
The event’s first day, held at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, will feature keynote addresses from Archbishop Guido Pozzo, secretary of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei; Cardinal Gerhard Müller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and president of the PCED; and Cardinal Robert Sarah, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship.
Pilgrims who come will participate in various other activities throughout the rest of the three days, including adoration and a Eucharistic procession presided over by Archbishop Pozzo on Sept. 16, followed by a Pontifical High Mass said by Cardinal Carlo Caffarra, Archbishop Emeritus of Bologna.
Titled “Summorum Pontificum: A renewed youth for the Church,” the pilgrimage is being organized by the “Priestly Friends of Summorum Pontificum” and “Youth and Tradition” associations in partnership with the Coetus Internationalis Summorum Pontificum.
Speaking of the title in comments to journalists, Fr. Nuara noted that a “truly surprising” phenomenon is that the “true protagonists” of this new “season of the Church … are the youth.”
In his letter accompanying the motu proprio, Benedict had noted that while “it has clearly been demonstrated that young persons too have discovered this liturgical form, felt its attraction and found in it a form of encounter with the Mystery of the Most Holy Eucharist, particularly suited to them.”
“Benedict XVI already in 2007 was aware that the new recipients of this liturgy, loved, desired and also sought, were the youth,” Fr. Nuara said.
Pope Francis has also commented on the fact that many of the enthusiasts for the Traditional Latin Mass are young people who never knew it growing up, but encountered it later.
“Youth can’t be nostalgic for something they didn’t know,” Fr. Nuara said, adding that “this is very nice, because by experience I can say that the youth who draw near to the ancient liturgy of the Church love it” for the reverence and silence of the celebration.
In celebrating the ancient form, “you really understand who is at the center, who the protagonist is,” the priest said, noting that “youth understand very well that this liturgy speaks of … the essential truth of the faith.”
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Lord have mercy. Just more evidence of the “evangelization through marketing” mindset.
If these absurd proposals are being seriously considered, it is nothing short of disgusting. This church is a house of worship for a specific religion, that of the Catholic church. There is no good reason to use lights, projections of foreign languages and other touristy gimmicks to lure visitors and non-catholics. Nor to turn it into the equivalent of a shopping mall or commercial building lobby, with just as much emotional appeal. This is not THEIR church. Nor should they install modern atrocities of “art” such as faceless and twisted lumps of steel which are supposed to represent saints, such as those I have seen elsewhere. Most of these are non-inspirational pieces of junk that could be replicated by the average artistically unskilled 8 year old. Something you could never say about a Michaelangelo. I would have imagined that falling attendance numbers and low collection plate hauls would have been enough to notify the woke clergy that leftist “one size fits all” attitudes, and modern global “renovations” are not welcome in their church structures. It’s as if they intend to appeal to everyone in the whole world, EXCEPT those who will actually worship here. How sad that they are so convinced of their own self-righteousness that they can’t understand this. I think they had better replace Father Drouin immediately, if not sooner, before he effects any permanent damage with this nonsense. Disgusting.
Calm down LJ. If the French ministry of culture doesn’t like it, detracting from the historical significance of the structure itself, it won’t get approved. If there is a public outcry anger reopening, they will change it.
They claim they will incorporate biblical verses. There are many that invoke warnings against vanity. Maybe the first verse they might use were they to take seriously enough the Catholic principle of never presuming superiority to the peoples of the past, hopefully leading to an reconsideration to cancel their whole stupid project would be: “What is man, that thou are mindful of him?”
In the French Revolution of 1789 the bloodthirsty and atheistic mob installed a naked prostitute on the high altar of Notre Dame as the “Goddess of Reason.” In 2021 the same bloodthirsty and atheistic mob want to exceed this blasphemy by turning all of Notre Dame into a Pachamama temple devoted to the worship of its Marxist this-world materialism, ecologism, modernism, and cultural and sexual “diversity.” This is occurring under the direction of an Archbishop of Paris who has been accused of fornication and adultery with a married woman.
How about some facts to attest to your statement that the Archbishop has been accused of fornication and adultery. Who made these charges and what is the level of trust you place on this source?
The French magazine ‘LePoint’ made the accusation. NCR followed: https://www.ncronline.org/news/vatican/paris-archbishop-offers-resignation-pope-francis-following-reports-questionable
When the cathedral was torched in 2019 conscientious people knew what would transpire — not the restoration of a timeless work of ecclesiastical architecture but the sacrilegious desecration of a consecrated church. Then we were assured that would not happen — and now here it is. I never believed it would be otherwise. A temple to earth goddess Pachamama is announced just days after Macron visited the South American Jesuit pope in Rome.
Hopefully, if this cannot be adverted, the ruin will collapse.
“What they are proposing to do to Notre-Dame would never be done to Westminster Abbey or St. Peter’s in Rome.” Really? We’ve seen nothing yet. We are in the hands of demonic liars in both Church and society.
I agree entirely. I am.utterly convinced that the burnig down of Notre Dame was deliberate and is extremely significant, a warning in fact to Europe and the world. Such desolating times,and yet a wonderful opportunity to keep the faith and by that I mean in Jesus Christ.
In the modern era, the persistent glory of French cathedrals has always been that as part of the national architectural heritage, whose maintenance is the responsibility of the state, they are mostly immune to the ravages of post-conciliar “renovators.” For many years, I have told my students that the worst thing that could ever happen to a French cathedral would be to transfer its custody to the French Catholic Church, instead of keeping it in the hands of the French government. I explained that the Church authorities would immediately set about “updating” the interiors in the same manner that German, Austrian, Swiss and American churches have very often been destroyed. Now, we are about to witness the truth of this in the tragic “Disneyland renovation” of Notre Dame de Paris.
In most nations, the liturgy was turned into an amusement park first, and the Churches wrecked afterwards, to better reflect the nonsense taking place in the interior. Since “wreckovation” has mostly been impossible in France, the dignified interiors have worked to check the worst abuses of liturgy. However, once Notre Dame’s interior is destroyed, it will become just another site for pantheistic expression, with Pachamama soon making her demonic presence on the altar.
He said that side chapels would feature “portraits from the 16th and 18th century that will be in dialogue with modern art objects.”
Vacuous and yet revealing. No sensible person speaks this way.
Nu-Church—destroying Catholicism since 1964.
Charcuterie, fondue and a sampling of regional French wines also provided and served on the altar like a brassarie I assume.