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"Would that be the authentic Mozarabic rite? I remember reading that someone said it has been 'modernized' after Vatican II."

"Purified" would be a better way of putting it.
After the Council, the Mozarabes were directed to de-latinize their liturgy, as were all Eastern Catholics. The current usage follows closely the version inthe very earliest manuscripts. When celebrated solemnly as in the Toledo Cathedral it is quite something to behold! BTW: It is still all in Vizigothic Latin!

Michael

Alex,

Thanks!

Yes I thought that the Mozarabic rite had been modernized.

I did know about Paul VI and Pius IX. Interesting, I think.

In Jesu et Maria,
Justin

Michael,

I believe Bugnini et al, were using the excuse of purification and returning to old usage when they made the Novus Ordo Missae. We know what that did to the ancient Latin rite. Isn't liturgy supposed to develop organicly over time? For that reason we do not uproot and take steps back that amount to 1000s of years.

I am certainly no expert, and since you have actually been to Spain and seen the Mozarabic rite, I will assume that you know a lot more about it than I do. However, the Mozarabic rite is very old, and was one of the rites allowed to exist by Trent. I don't see how Latinizations would have crept in. Can you explain?

In Jesu et Maria,
Justin

I can't give specific examples, as I am not an expert either. From what the Dean of the Capilla Mozarabe in Toledo told me in person, Cardinal Cisneros had significantly altered the rite when he produced the PRINTED version of the Missal in the 16th century. He wanted to bring the rite into conformity with the 1570 Roman Missal, which did a great deal of violence to the traditional text. He also turned it into a museum piece by forbidding communion to anyone but the celebrant (!). Since 1967 a return has been made to what was done before 1570. I'm not talking about the kind of "reform" of the Roman Rite that you quite rightly object to.


"I am certainly no expert, and since you have actually been to Spain and seen the Mozarabic rite, I will assume that you know a lot more about it than I do. However, the Mozarabic rite is very old, and was one of the rites allowed to exist by Trent. I don't see how Latinizations would have crept in. Can you explain?"

In Jesu et Maria,
Justin[/QB][/QUOTE]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Dr John:
[QB]I have just caught up with this thread since I've been in rural southwestern Iowa where there is no internet access in hotels save through long distance at $1 per minute. But now I'm in Des Moines..... "Free at last, free at last...."

Dr. John:

Great to have you back!

Michael

Along the same lines in this post, I remember an article in the Wanderer a few years ago about a spokesman for some traditionalist RC's who had fled the Novus Ordo and had joined a Ukrainian Catholic parish somewhere in the Northeast. Anyway, the author was scandalized because the parish they were attending was starting to ACTUALLY use some ORTHODOX books for catechesis of his children...YIKES! He cited this as "proof" that the UGCC was also now infected with modernist ecumania...

Anyway, this joker proceeded to form a group called Concerned Catholics for Preservation of Latinized Baggage in the Ukrainian Catholic Church or something or other (I'm going to have to get to confession for being so facetious), but this must not have gone far becuase I haven't heard from them for some time. This article was right before Metropolitan Stefan Soroka was consecrated Metropolitan and not to long after the election of Kyr Lubomyr as Patriarch...let's hope they saw the writing on the wall and headed back to the Tridentine Rite.

I'm sure that guy would have a stroke if he read the 2000 Catechetical Directory for the Ukrainian Catholic Church...if he did read it he would probably think theosis is some sort of medical condition...

We've plenty of Latinized baggage we need to shed ourselves of already without having to deal with a "new wave" of Latin traditionalists who are Novus Ordo refugees, those who romanticize the celibate clergy, Stations of the Cross, Latinized catechetics based on the Baltimore, First Communion, etc., who want to impose their concept of "tradition" on us and who snub their fellow Novus Ordo Catholics with, "We attend the Ukrainian Rite Mass". We don't need that kind of help, thank you very much. If you're going to join our parishes, it's all the way. Married priests, icons, no pews, theosis, Communion for infants, everything.
Subdeacon Randolph, a degenerate sinner

Subdeacon Randolph (sorry, as a Latin I do not know the proper address for Eastern Subdeacons),

Would you also be against "Tridentine Latins" who just attend Divine Liturgy at your parish, but don't join it, or try to force anything on you?

They generally view your Liturgy as traditional, whereas the Novus Ordo certainly is not.

In Jesu et Maria,
Justin

I know many Orthodox have private opinions, but it actually has been since the Roman Catholic reform of the Mass that the most progress has been made in official Orthodox-Catholic dialogue.

Important is the breakthrough Catholic-Orthodox "Agreed Statement on the Eucharist" in 1969 and the 1970 statement by SCOBA "On the Reforms of the Roman Catholic Mass" which, while silence on cerain topics may be noted, where it commented, it was entirely favorable.

I would say while Orthodox Christians (including myself) might offer various private and pastoral criticisms (when solicited), we have not raised any official objections in the extensive and important offical dialogue between our two communions.

[ 06-16-2002: Message edited by: Axios ]

Sorry Justin, I was "going off" on this Wanderer article and the presumption of such a group who sees themselves as "saving" the Ukrainian Catholic Church from "modernist ecumenical tendencies" when they should take the time to learn authentic Byzantine spirituality, liturgical customs, theology, etc. Even though its probably been two years since I have seen this article it still jolts me.

Looking at the official position of the Church as expressed in such documents as Orientale Lumen and Orientalium Ecclesiorum it is these self-appointed "experts" as mentioned in the article who are opposed to the official teaching of the Church by not promoting our churches to return to a more authentic Eastern liturgical and theological heritage.

Of course we welcome ANY and ALL visitors, absolutely, the more the merrier. And not just RCs. Anyone is welcome. I think it is especially imperative that all Catholics experience the traditions of the Catholic East, as the Holy Father so eloquently pointed out in Orientale Lumen.

My point is that we would rather not have groups of traditionalist RCs forming action groups within our churches to impose their own Latinized vision of our church on us to "save us". That's all, to get right to the point. And I know of many conservative RCs who can and do make the transition to the Eastern Catholic churches without making this kind of trouble.

Learning about any tradition, especially one that seems quite exotic as does the Byzantine from the Roman perspective, is going to take time which I certainly appreciate and I don't expect anyone to come in and know everything (which no one except God does anyway).

I just don't think it helps the Eastern Catholic churches in the long run return to a more authentic and traditional Eastern existence (which is the official position of the Roman Catholic Church)with certain disgruntled RCs joining our churches and trying to save us from their perceived fears and phobias of modernism, ecumenism, etc. By our being more Eastern, this is seen by these as simply being more like the Orthodox who are in their estimation outside of the Roman Catholic Church and in their book this is compromising with schismatics, false ecumenism, etc. etc. etc.

This is certainly not a blanket judgement of the RCs coming to our churches, and please don't take it as such. In fact some of our most faithful parishoners are precisely wonderful RC people. But for someone coming out of a counter-Reformational traditionalist/reactionary Tridentine mindset, it is often difficult to accept a return to a genuinely Eastern ecclesiological, spiritual, and theological approach in our churches which is mandated through OE and OL. And the resulting post-Vatican II orientation of our churches to begin to comply with this vision is seen by some RC traditionalists as somehow falling into this or that "modernist trap". Unfortunately their idea of "Tradition" for our church and our idea of tradition for our church (or for that matter, the post-Vatican II ideas of tradition for our church expressed in OL/OE) eventually have opposing tenets.

But, on the other hand, if they want to join our parishes and be truly open to the fullness of Eastern Christianity, and respect our right to reestablish and strengthen our rightful patrimony, even if they have differing opinions personally, may God be with them and "come on in".

Good point Axios. And it was Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenogoras who in 1965, the same year as the conclusion of Vatican II, who mutually dismissed the excommunications of 1054. I don't think such a move would have been possible or popular before the Council.

Dear Axios,

I think that it was Vatican II and its altered attitudes toward the Orthodox that is responsible for the better theological climate between Rome and the East, rather than the Novus Ordo Mass.

I just don't see any causality on the part of the NO at all, and if anything the Orthodox have closed their eyes to it when talking theology with the RC's.

Vatican II ended the RC monolithic view of the Church and laid the groundwork for openness with the East especially.

But current RC policy moves in Eastern Europe have certainly raised many Catholic and Orthodox eyebrows.

Alex

Dear Sarum,

Yes, the Mozarabic Rite has indeed been purified of Latinisms that crept in!

But a professor of liturgics I met said that he doesn't like the idea of including elements of the Mozarabic Rite into the NO.

He said the Mozarabic Rite is either served "properly" with back to the people, or else they should just stick with the NO in Spain.

And yes, it is a most beautiful Liturgy!

Alex

Hi Alex.

I am unaware that any element of the Mozarabic Rite being introduced into the N.O. Usually it has been the other way around.

But a professor of liturgics I met said that he doesn't like the idea of including elements of the Mozarabic Rite into the N.O.

Everywhere it is celebrated in Spain (that I saw anyway)the celebrant faced away from the people.

Best!

Michael

He said the Mozarabic Rite is either served "properly" with back to the people, or else they should just stick with the NO in Spain.

And yes, it is a most beautiful Liturgy!

Alex[/QB][/QUOTE]

+JMJ+

I beleive there is one key issue when discussing the Tridentine vs. Novus Ordo Lituegies. That issue is the way in which the Litrgy is developed.

The Tridentine Liturgy as Lance and others have pointed out, has borrowed heavily from various rites throughout the Churches, but it has always developed this overtime. This process of develoment is known as Organic Development. The Mass has of course changed overtime. But the Consecration of the Mass as well as the general outline has remained intrinsically the same since the time of earlist Church in Rome. Therefore it is proper to refer to the Tridentine Liturgy as the Gregorian Liturgy or as the Ancient Latin Mass.

The Novus Ordo was developed by a group of people, many of them Protestants, who sat in a committee and determined how they thought the Mass should look. What happened in the earliest days of the NO, before this group took over, was simply a condensing of the Tridentine Mass. This would be a perfectly acceptable organic development of the Liturgy. Then this commiittee took control and have butchered the Liturgy. ICEL and other groups like the same ahve destroyed the reverence and tradition that was retained in the original Missal of Paul VI. OCP has supplanted the great beuty of Gregorian Chant and Sacred Polyphony whith Neo-Protestant, often Heretical, cr*p. The German Bishops and the Bishops of Holland introduced Communion in the Hand. The list goes on and on.

What decent Eastern Catholic or Eastern Orthodox whould not suffer a stroke if a female Eucharistic Minister distributed Communion at a Divine Liturgy? IF there were female altar servers? If the people communicated themselves from the Chalice? IF tommorrow your Bishops abolished Minor Orders whould not Subdeacon Randolf and Reader Sergius bemoan such a tragedy? Why then is there uncharity to us traditional Roman Riters when these things, these sacrilages, have been forced upon us?

Joe Zollars

+JMJ+

The Mozarabic Rite, Ambrosian Rite, and all the other rites have been butchered. The only part of the Fransiscan Rite that remains is the Fransiscan Calander. The Carthusian and Dominican Rites, as well as the rites of other religious orders, have been completely suppressed.

On the other hand, the Holy Father has asked for Spain, Portugaul, and Milan to return the Mozarabic, Bragan, and Ambrosian Rites respectfully. It is customary for the Holy Father to ask the new primate of England everytime one is installed if he would like to return to the Sarum Rite. Usually the Primate refuses. The HOly Father wishes very much to return to the true and proper Western Rites that form part of the Western Church.

Unfortunatley these Rites cannot flourish or even come back within the confines of the Novus Ordo Missae.

Joe Zollars