The Ark

As far back as the 4th Century the Mass referred to the Eucharist and has therefore been the most important part of the liturgy. The performance of the Mass has undergone some changes, particularly after the liberal teachings of Vatican II in the 1960s. But the Vatican has recently issued new guidelines aimed at making the Mass more uniform. Paul Stenhouse discusses the history and development of the Catholic Mass.

Transcript

This transcript was typed from a recording of the program. The ABC cannot guarantee its complete accuracy because of the possibility of mishearing and occasional difficulty in identifying speakers.

THEME

Rachael Kohn: The Vatican is about to issue new guidelines that will change the way Catholics around the world celebrate the Mass.

Hello, this is The Ark, and I'm Rachael Kohn.

The Mass has been one of the constants in the 2000 year history of the church. Its origins go back to the beginning of the faith, and its liturgical form has been remarkably enduring. But in recent years the Mass has been changed as a result of the liberalisation of the church in the 1960s during the Second Vatican Council. But the new missal aims to stem that tide. Father Paul Stenhouse, the editor of Annals Australasia, thinks that's a good idea.

Paul Stenhouse: I think that most Catholics are grateful for the concern that the Vatican is showing about some kind of uniformity in the liturgy, because as you know, after the Second Vatican Council and the publication of the Constitution on the Liturgy in 1963 in December, there was a lot of leeway given in attempts to accommodate the liturgy to the vernacular, because there's something like 250 or more languages whose translations have to be conformed to the editio typica of the Roman missal, and the Roman sacramentary, so that for the sacraments and for the Mass, in all these languages throughout the world, somebody is responsible for ensuring that theologically and liturgically and in other ways, that there is some kind of strict loyalty to the original.

Rachael Kohn: Which is Latin.

Paul Stenhouse: Which is Latin. A number of documents have come out from the Holy See, five of them actually since 1963, which have tried gently to pull things into line. But at the same time respecting the need for people to actually try to work out how to do this, because it hasn't been easy, there hasn't been any precedent in the Catholic church for this kind of literary development within the liturgy.

Rachael Kohn: When Vatican II happened and Pope Paul VI introduced some changes, were they substantive, did he actually introduce prayers or blessings that were new to the liturgy?

Paul Stenhouse: Not really. Pope Paul VI was the Pope who approved the acts of the Council because he was the Pope that had to see the Council to its conclusion. When he approved the constitution on the liturgy, it wasn't in his mind, and it certainly wasn't the mind of the Council that Mass wouldn't be celebrated in Latin, as well as in the vernacular.

It was the intention of the Council quite clearly expressed, that Mass would be in Latin and there would be vernacular Masses as well. And Article 36 of that constitution starts off by saying in paragraph 1 that the use of the Latin language is to be preserved by the Latin rite, while maintaining particular lore. And the particular lore means that certain episcopal conferences have the right to introduce the vernacular into their countries if they think it will be helpful to the people, but that it was never intended that one should actually replace the other.

Now this is something which by and large never emerges in any discussion of these liturgical matters, and you rather get the impression that the vernacular replaced the Latin, and then you find of course certain people who were offended by that, wanted to have Mass in Latin and then they want to have Mass in the old rite before the Second Vatican Council, and often they make a big issue of this, but in fact as Paul VI said on a number of occasions in public, all people have to do if they want to attend Mass in the old rite, is to ask permission and they can get it.

Rachael Kohn: Well I guess it just points out that people were ready to hear the Mass in their own language, and of course that developed into the inclusive language for example. Is that movement now being sort of turned back a bit? Is that really the aim of the changes now, to go back to a more historically correct liturgy, one that is more faithful to the original Latin?

Paul Stenhouse: Well I think that that's the aim to go back to ensure that the typical edition, the Latin edition of the missal and the sacramentaries, that these two sources, that these are faithfully translated.

But also I notice that in the decrees that have come out from Holy See, there's been a lot of concern lest in the translations ideological and political issues should intrude, and within the liturgy itself the way words are translated should actually be used as a tool to further certain ideological or political causes. For example, I think the question of inclusive or exclusive language, the fact that there are certain collective nouns and pronouns that can include male and female in English, and in other languages, they're in disfavour in certain quarters because some people take offence at them.

But I notice that the decree warned that care should be taken to ensure that there be no political, ideological overtones in the translation, because it's a sacred text, it's a religious text, it's not a political text or sociological text or a psychological text. And there may be other place where these things can be discussed, but it does seem to be pushing things a bit I think to force the language for ideological reasons.

Rachael Kohn: Well let's look at the origins of the Mass. Is it the last supper? Is that where it all begins?

Paul Stenhouse: Well it is the last supper, and the promises that our lord made before the last supper. But the actual words of the Mass, the ceremony itself, the liturgical ceremony, takes its origins from the last supper. The gospels of Matthew and Mark and Luke and John, as well as the epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians, have all got a description of the last supper, and in St Paul, of the way the Christians celebrated this commemoration of the last meal that Jesus had with his disciples, and then the promise that he would give them his body and his blood, and the sacrificial nature of this, and the fact that he was the paschal lamb and so on, and it's connection with Pesach (Passover). So the Mass itself is really the commemoration, the repetition, the celebration of this promise made by Jesus that he would be with his followers till the end of time and he would be present in the form of bread and wine.

Rachael Kohn: Well the liturgy has certainly grown from there. It's a much larger and much more almost symphonic kind of event. When did that all start to happen?

Paul Stenhouse: There are early texts of the Mass. Justin Martyr for example, in around 150-odd, he describes the liturgy of his day and it is substantially, in terms of its sections anyway, substantially what it is today.

There are some scripture readings and there's a presiding priest who consecrates the bread and the wine. There's an offertory, there's prayers for the living and the dead and so on. And at the end there's a communion, and after the Mass the consecrated bread is taken home to be given to people who are sick or otherwise. You've got a description say from the middle of the second century, say 215 AD, you've got Hippolytus, the Bishop of Rome, giving a description of the Mass in his day, and it starts off in a very Jewish and also very familiar way, I think, for people who attend Mass today. This is the way the Preface begins:

The Lord be with you.
(And then everybody responds) And with thy spirit.
Lift up your hearts.
We've lifted them on high.
Let us give thanks to the Lord.
It is meet and just.
(And then there's a beautiful prayer in praise of Jesus, and then it goes on)

He stretched out his hands in his passion in order that he might deliver from suffering those who believe in thee. And at the moment when he delivered himself voluntarily to his passion, in order to destroy death, to break the devil's chains, to spurn Hell under his feet, to fix a term, to show forth his Resurrection, taking bread and giving thanks he said, Take, eat, this is my body which shall be mangled for you.

Likewise the cup, saying This is my blood which is shed for you. When you do this, do this in my memory.

And then the Canon of the Mass continues, as it does today with all sorts of other prayers and it ends up so that we may praise thee and glorify thee by thy child, Jesus Christ, by whom to thee is glory and honour, to the father, son and holy ghost in your holy church now and for all ages. Amen.

And of course the Amen is a Jewish prayer, it's a conclusion, it's an untranslatable word. This great Amen which has been made much of by the church in the liturgy, but as I say, if you go back to 155 with Justin, you've got the same liturgy present and if you go back to the description given in the gospels, you can see that all the elements are present there. Substantially you'd say that there isn't a great deal of change between the present liturgy and say the liturgy of Hippolytus.

Rachael Kohn: Well Holy Week is certainly the high point, the culmination of the liturgical year. Is there anything special or specifically inserted into the Mass at this time?

Paul Stenhouse: Well there is. I mean on Holy Thursday you've got the commemoration of the institution of the Eucharist, the bishop anoints the oils that are going to be used during the year by priests to anoint people and for baptism and for extreme unction and so on. And then on Friday at 3 o'clock you've got the commemoration of our Lord's death and placing the body in the tomb, and the church is stripped bare of ornament, and it's a very beautiful and simple ceremony with an Adoration of the Cross. And then nothing on Holy Saturday until midnight on Holy Saturday eve, when you have the Mass of the Resurrection. But there haven't been substantially any changes to that liturgy.

The only thing I'd say that I miss is that there used to be a lot of the use of the dirges of Jeremiah and some of the Old Testament prophets, Isaiah and so on, they used to be made much of, but I don't know exactly why they were changed and left out, possibly because the liturgy became too long.

Rachael Kohn: Those were certainly powerful texts. But I wonder whether today going on Saturday night to the Mass is really the high point for Christians in the year. Is that the one time of the year that they dare not miss?

Paul Stenhouse: Well it's certainly the most important feast in the church's calendar. It's more important than Christmas, and yet I don't know that it's more popular than Christmas, I think the midnight Mass at Christmas is certainly, most people try to attend it. But the Easter Mass is certainly very well attended, even people who may not get to Mass on other Sundays, do somehow or another manage to find their way there on Easter.

Rachael Kohn: Now we know that the Orthodox church celebrates Easter at a different time on a different date, but are there any similarities between the Orthodox rite and the Roman rite?

Paul Stenhouse: Oh yes, there are any number of similarities. The difference is principally in the language and the fact that the liturgy, which is called the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, who was an Archbishop of Constantinople and died in 404, it's a very beautiful liturgy, but its elements are virtually the same as in the Latin rite, but they are accompanied by all sorts of very colourful and very beautiful ceremonial, much of which is derived from the fact that that liturgy grew up in the imperial court in Constantinople.

Greek was the language of the empire, even in Rome the Masses were originally said in Greek, and there are little bits of it still left, like Kyrie Eleison and Hagios, there are Greek words which still occur in the Latin liturgy.

Rachael Kohn: How about Theotokas, the mother of Christ, now in the Greek Orthodox tradition Mary has a greater role, does she not?

Paul Stenhouse: I don't think she has a greater role, but she's got as great a role anyway.

Rachael Kohn: Does Mary make much of an appearance in the Easter Mass?

Paul Stenhouse: Mary does, and in the old sequence, there's a sequence, a beautiful sequence. Our lady, she does appear, but she's in every Mass, it's sort of, how shall I say? She's there, not understated but implicit and present. But I for one am very grateful that some steps have been taken to ensure that there is this attempt to ensure that the belief and the worship that these things mesh very closely together, and that people can tell what we believe by what we actually say, the prayers we say and how we offer the Mass.

Rachael Kohn: That's Father Paul Stenhouse, the Editor of Annals Australasia, a Journal of Catholic Culture. And this is The Ark.

Next week, how a 19th century Italian Jewish family fought to reclaim their stolen child, who'd been secretly baptized. The infamous Mortara Affair.

That's The Ark, with me, Rachael Kohn.

THEME

Guests

Paul Stenhouse
is the Editor of Annals Australasia: A Journal of Catholic Culture.

Further Information

New Eucharist Rules
http://www.cathnews.com/news/403/92.php