ZEPHYRINUS.

Monday 15 August 2022

The Assumption !!! “All Hail The Wife And Mother Of God” !!! A Very Happy Feast Of The Assumption To All Readers.

ESPOSA E MARE DE DÉU
e Himne Processional - Misteri d'Elx (S. XV).
Available on YouTube at
YOU TUBE

Text is taken from, and can be read in full at,
RORATE CÆLI

Since the Mid-15th-Century, this Theatrical Performance has been performed in the Basilica of Santa Maria and in the streets of the old City of Elche, situated in the region of Valencia. It is a living testimony of European Religious theatre of The Middle Ages and of the cult of The Virgin.

This Theatrical Performance, which is entirely sung, comprises two acts, performed on 14 August and 15 August. These depict the death and crowning of The Virgin in a series of scenes and related paintings: The death of Mary, the night procession that is followed by hundreds of participants carrying candles, the morning procession, the afternoon funeral procession in the streets of Elche, and the enactment of the burial, Assumption and Coronation in the Basilica. (Unesco)

Mystery Plays and Passion Plays inside a Church were not uncommon before the Protestant revolts, but were severely curtailed after The Catholic Reformation. The Mystery Play of Elx (Misteri d'Elx in Valencian/Catalan, Misterio de Elche in Spanish) was a rare exception after Trent, allowed specifically for the Basilica of Saint Mary in Elx (Alicante, Valencia) by Pope Urban VIII. All participating actors are still today men, not women, as it has been since its inception, most probably in the 15th-Century.

The video, above, depicts a version of one of the main compositions of the play, Esposa e Mare de Déu (Wife and Mother of God), and of the processional Hymn, with images of the Play and its Traditional special effects, as well as the procession.

English: The Assumption of The Virgin Mary.
Deutsch: Maria Himmelfahrt,
Hochaltar für St. Maria Gloriosa dei Frari in Venedig.
Français: L'Assomption de la Vierge.
Artist: Titian (1490–1576).
Date: 1516-1518.
Current location: Institution:Santa Maria Gloriosa
dei Frari, Venice, Italy.
Source/Photographer: The Yorck Project:
10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei.
DVD-ROM, 2002. ISBN 3936122202.
Distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH.
(Wikimedia Commons)

Time After Pentecost (Part Three). Historical Note.

Text from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal,
unless stated otherwise.

Illustrations: Zephyrinus,
unless stated otherwise.

The last scene of the Apostolate of Saint Andrew was Achaia, where he died a Martyr at Patras.

Saint Thomas took himself to Persia and India, where he was put to death at Calamina.

Saint James the Less, brother of Saint Jude, and Bishop of Jerusalem, was stoned to death about 62 A.D. by order of The High Priest, Hanan II.

In the division of the Apostolate, Scythia fell to Saint Philip. He converted this Country and then went to Hierapolis in Phrygia, where he was crucified and stoned.

According to The Breviary, Saint Bartholomew traversed that part of India which lies beyond The Ganges, this region falling to him by lot. He then directed his steps towards Armenia, where he was skinned alive and beheaded.

A Tradition assigns Ethiopia to the author of the first Gospel, Saint Matthew, who was Martyred while Celebrating The Holy Mysteries.

“The Taking Of Christ”.
Artist: Caravaggio (1571–1610).
Date: 1602.
Collection: National Gallery of Ireland.
(Wikimedia Commons)

The East was assigned to Saint Jude, brother of Saint James the Less, who wrote a Catholic Epistle and who died a Martyr like Saint Simon the Canaanite.

Saint John had fixed his Seat at Ephesus, from whence he governed the Churches of Asia Minor. It was there that he wrote his Gospel and probably, as Preface and Introduction to it, his First Epistle.

The Fourteen Auxiliary Saints.
The name of “Auxiliary Saints” is given to a group of fourteen Saints particularly noted for the efficacy of their intercession. They are often represented together.
Illustration: UNA VOCE OF ORANGE COUNTY
Artist: René de Cramer.
“Copyright Brunelmar/Ghent/Belgium”.
Used with Permission.

Brought to Rome, under Emperor Domitian, he was thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil (Feast 6 May) and emerged unscathed. He was then banished to Patmos. He died at Ephesus under Emperor Trajan in 100 A.D. or 101 A.D.

With very few exceptions, such as Saint Gregory the Wonderworker (Feast 17 November), Saint Mary Magdalen (Feast 22 July), Saint Martha (Feast 29 July), Saint Petronilla (Feast 31 May), the Saints of the first four Centuries A.D., in The Roman Calendar, suffered Martyrdom.

[Editor: The Epistles and Gospels referred to in this Article are those read on Sundays After Pentecost.]

This concludes the Time After Pentecost.

Why Restoring The Roman Rite To Its Fullness Is Not “Traddy Antiquarianism”.

A Folded Chasuble: A sign of Penance.
Abolished by Pope Pius XII.
Illustration: NEW LITURGICAL MOVEMENT

This Article is taken from, and can be read in full at,

NEW LITURGICAL MOVEMENT

By: Peter Kwasniewski.

This Article is reprinted from 15 August 2020.

In a recent address, Archbishop Thomas Gullickson, Papal Nuncio to Switzerland and Liechtenstein, made a rousing case for “pressing the reset button” on The Roman Liturgy by abandoning a failed experiment and taking up again The Traditional Rites of The Catholic Church. He is giving us a brisk version of what the newly-published book, The Case for Liturgical Restoration, provides in much detail.

Then, with admirable candour, Archbishop Gullickson broaches the million-dollar question:

“I am avoiding the burning issue of setting a date for the reset. I used to think that going back to The 1962 Missal and to Pope Saint Pius X and his Breviary reform was sufficient, but the marvels of the pre-Pius XII Triduum, as we have begun to experience them, leave me speechless on this point. Perhaps the teaching of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI on the mutual enrichment of the two Forms will provide the paradigm for resolving the question of which Missal and which Breviary. My call for a return to the presently-approved Texts for The Extraordinary Form, then, is inspired by a certain urgency to move forward, to further the process. I do not feel qualified to take a stance in this particular matter of where best to launch the restoration”.

The position that has dominated the Tradisphere, for a long time, is that we should be content with 1962 as our point of departure for a healthy Liturgical future. After all, 1962 is the last “Editio Typica” prior to the upheavals occasioned by The Council; it is still recognisably in continuity with The Tridentine Rite; and it is enjoined upon us by Church authority in The Motu Proprio “Summorum Pontificum”.

In a contrasting position, Dom Hugh Somerville-Knapman, of “Dominus Mihi Adjutor”, urges that we must still take seriously the Constitution “Sacrosanctum Concilium” and that, accordingly, the 1962 Missal will not pass muster:

“I still see a validity in a mild reform in The Liturgy along the modest lines actually mandated by The Council: Vernacular Readings, setting aside the duplication of The Celebrant having to recite Prayers, etc., that were being sung by other Ministers, a less obtrusive Priestly preparation at the beginning of Mass, etc. And The Conciliar mandate for reform cannot be just forgotten as though it never happened; it must be faced and dealt with, either by reforming the reform made in its name, or by a specific magisterial act abrogating it.

That is why the interim rites interest me – OM65 [The Ordo Missae of 1965] is clearly the Mass of Vatican II, while also clearly being in organic continuity with Liturgical Tradition. It left The Canon alone, as well as the integral reverence of The Liturgical action. Even Lefebvre was approving of it. What distorts our perception of OM65 is that we have seen fifty years of development since, and cannot help but see OM65 as tainted by what came after it.

Moreover, MR62 is a rather arbitrary point at which to stop Liturgical Tradition. For some committed Trads, this is an imperfect Missal, even a tainted one. Is a pre-53 Missal better ? Or a pre-Pius XII one ? Or maybe pre-Pius X ? Why not go the whole hog and argue for pre-Trent — after all, Geoffrey Hull sees the seed of Liturgical decay there ? We end up in a situation in which each chooses for himself on varying sets of idiosyncratic principles. It is ecclesiologically impossible.

The Catholic Church has a magisterial authority which establishes unity in Liturgy. That this has been sadly lacking for some decades is not an argument for ignoring magisterial authority altogether. Then, we may as well be Protestants”.

Dom Hugh is willing to admit that Bugnini and Co. were busy behind the scenes throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, plotting and eventually carrying out the rape and pillage of all that remained of The Western Liturgical Tradition.

He nevertheless thinks that, in the World outside the Politburo, the 1965 Missal was generally seen — and can still be seen today — as the reform that lines up with The Council’s “desiderata”. This, then, should be where the reset button takes us. (To brush up on what the 1965 Missal was like, read this account by Msgr. Charles Pope.)

A Missal from the Mid-60s: Trying to keep up with the changes.

As far as I can tell, however, the purist 1962 and reformist 1965 positions are rapidly losing ground throughout the World, particularly as the Internet continues to spread awareness of the ill-advised and sometimes catastrophic reforms that took place throughout the 20th-Century to various aspects of the Roman Liturgy, with Holy Week looming largest. Since I, too, disagree with the 1962 and 1965 positions, I would like to make the case for returning to the last “Editio Typica” prior to the revolutionary alterations of Pope Pius XII: The Missale Romanum of Benedict XV, issued in 1920.

The principal argument, used to defend adherence to 1962, is that we should all do “what The Church asks us to do.” But who, or what, is “The Church”, here ? In this period of chaos, it is no longer self-evident that “The Church” refers to an authority that is handing down laws for the common good of the people of God.

From at least 1948 onwards, “The Church”, in The Liturgical sphere, has meant radicals, struggling to loose the bonds of Tradition, who have pushed their own agenda of simplification, abbreviation, Modernisation, and pastoral utilitarianism on The Church, with Papal approval — that is, by the abuse of Papal power.

These things are not rightful commands to be obeyed, but aberrations that deserve to be resisted — of course, patiently, intelligently, and in a principled manner, but nevertheless with a firm intention to restore the integrity and fullness of The Roman rite as it existed before The Liturgical Movement in its cancer phase took over at the top level and drove The Roman Rite into the dead end of The Novus Ordo.

For a long time, I sincerely tried to understand, appreciate, and embrace “Sacrosanctum Concilium”. But it was not possible, after reading Michael Davies, and later Henry Sire’s Phoenix from the Ashes and Yves Chiron’s biography of Annibale Bugnini, to see in this document anything more than a carefully contrived blueprint for Liturgical revolution. It contradicts itself on several points and takes refuge more often than not in massive ambiguities that were deliberately put there — and we know this based on documentary research, no conspiracy theories are needed.

For me, the evaporation of the validity of “Sacrosanctum Concilium” came from a deeper reflection, thanks to a lecture by Wolfram Schrems, on the meaning of its abolition of The Office of Prime. A Council that would dare to abolish an ancient Liturgical Office of uninterrupted universal reception vitiates itself from the get-go. Since none of the documents of Vatican II contains “de fide” statements or anathemas, the charism of Infallibility is not expressly involved.

Given their very nature, a bunch of practical pastoral recommendations can be mistaken, and there is ever-mounting evidence that the aims and means of the radical arm of The Liturgical Movement were grievously off-target.

The assumptions of The Council, about what “had to be done” to The Liturgy, misread the sociology and psychology of Religion. Their proposals for reform bought into modern assumptions that have not stood the test of time and had, indeed, already been effectively criticised before and during The Council. So, it seems to me somewhat immaterial that ‘65 better reflects the conflicting and, at times, problematic ideas of The Council.

Moreover, the idea that The 1965 Ordo Missae represents the implementation of “Sacrosanctum Concilium” is hard to sustain in the light of repeated statements by Paul VI that what he promulgated in 1969 is the ultimate fulfilment of The Liturgy Constitution (see here and here for examples culled by the selectively papolatrous PrayTell; I discuss the infamous addresses of 1965 and 1969 here). 1965 was presented publicly (though not always consistently) as an interim step on the evolutionary process away from Mediæval-Baroque Liturgy to relevant Modern Liturgy.

The “moment of truth,” I think, is when students of Liturgy realise that the 1962 is extremely similar to 1965 in this respect: It was an interim Missal, in the preparation of which Bugnini, and the other Liturgists working at The Vatican, had changed as much as they felt they could get away with.

Even assuming all the good will in the World, these Liturgists had experienced a triumph of renovationism with The Holy Week “reform” of Pius XII — a reform that was notable as a dramatic deformation of some of the most ancient and poignant Rites of The Church — and they were rolling along with the momentum.

The abolition under Pius XII of most Octaves and Vigils, multiple Collects, and Folded Chasubles, “inter alia”, is part of this same sad tale of cutting away some of what was most distinctive and most precious in the Roman heritage.

This is why it is not arbitrary for Traditionalists to say that The Missal, circa 1948 — which means, in practice, the “Editio Typica” of 1920 — is the place to go.

The reason is simple: Except for some newly-added Feasts (the Calendar being the part of The Liturgy that changes the most), it is in all salient respects The Missal codified by Trent. It is The Tridentine Rite “tout court”. For those of us who believe that The Tridentine Rite represents, as a whole and in its parts, an organically developed apogee of The Roman Rite, that it behoves us to receive with gratitude as a timeless inheritance (in the manner Greek Catholics receive their Liturgical Rites, which also achieved mature form in The Middle Ages), a pre-Pacellian Missal gives us all that we are looking for, and nothing tainted.

People like to point to “improvements” that could be made to the old Missal, but those who have lived long and intimately with its contents are usually the last to be convinced that the suggested improvements would actually be such. I have addressed some examples here, here, and here.

A Maria Laach Altar Missal from 1931.

Wait a minute, an interlocutor might say. Isn’t all this “Traddy Antiquarianism” ? Aren’t we guilty of doing the same thing we blame our opponents for doing, namely, reaching back to earlier forms while holding later developments in contempt ?

No, none of what I am proposing amounts to “Traddy Antiquarianism.”

What is clear is that The Liturgical Movement after World War II went off the rails. Changes to The Liturgical Books, from that point on, were motivated by global theories about what is “best for The Modern Church,” which led to the abundant contradictions and ambiguities of “Sacrosanctum Concilium”, the Montini-Bugnini reign of terror, and the crowning disgrace of The 1969 Ordo Missæ and other Rites of that period.

The point is not to go back indefinitely, but to take a Missal that is essentially the one codified by Trent and Pius V, with the kind of small accretions or small emendations that characterise the slow progress of Liturgy through the ages. As Fr. Hunwicke likes to point out, for many Centuries since Pius V, it is possible to take up an old Missal and put it on the Altar and offer Mass. The changes are so minor that the Missal is virtually the same from “Quo Primum” to the 20th-Century.

Saints come on and Saints come off, but even the Calendar is remarkably stable. After Pius XII’s reign, however, it is much harder for an “old” Missal and a “new” (i.e., 1955 Pacellian, 1962 Roncallian, 1965 Montinian) Missal to share the same ecclesial space; they cannot be swapped one for the other, including at some very important moments in The Church Year.

This already shows, in a rough and ready way, that a rupture has occurred — and this, prior to The Novus Ordo.

Pope Saint Pius V’s condition that only Rites older than 200 years could continue to be used, after his promulgation of The Tridentine Missal, is another way to see that our argument here is backed by common sense.

A Rite, younger than 200 years, old might seem like a local made-up thing, but a Rite that’s clocked up two Centuries of age, or more, has an “immemorial” weight to it — something not to be disturbed or replaced.

This, indeed, is the basic reason for the illegitimacy of The Novus Ordo; that which it replaced was not merely something older than 200 years, but something with a 2,000-year history of continual use that shows no momentous ruptures, but only a gradual assimilation and expansion.

But the 200-year rule of Pius V also suggests that the revival of something less than 200 years old need not be an example of Antiquarianism, but could be simply an intelligent recovery of something lost by chance, error in transmission, or bad policy.

Thus, if certain Octaves and Vigils were abolished only a few decades ago, and if the rationale for this change deserves to be rejected, their recovery cannot be considered, by any stretch of the imagination, an example of Antiquarianism.

After all, as The Case for Liturgical Restoration points out (pp. 14, 16), The Old Testament gives us examples of Liturgical Restoration far more dramatic than the recovery of pre-Pacellian Rites is for us.

Antiquarianism or Archaeologism — often qualified with the adjective “False” — is the attempt to leap over Mediæval and Counter-Reformation developments to reach a putatively “original, authentic” Early-Christian Liturgy. The term does not correctly apply to setting aside Modernist, progressive, or utilitarian deformations.

How ironic if a move against false Antiquarianism were now to be targeted as being, itself, an example of the same ! Let us put it this way: Catholics have always been intelligently Antiquarian in that they care greatly for, and wish to preserve, their heritage, and seek to restore it when it has been plundered or damaged. The Liturgical Movement, on the other hand, presented us with the spectacle of an arbitrary, violent, and agenda-driven Antiquarianism. The two phenomena are as different as Patriotism and Nationalism.

Our situation in The Latin Church has achieved the clarity of a Silver-Point drawing:

(1) The modern Papal Rite, risibly dubbed The Roman Rite, has established itself as a pseudo-tradition of vernacularity, versus populism, informality, banality, and horizontality, as NLM contributor William Riccio described with gut-wrenching accuracy;

(2) The “Reform of the Reform,” on which hopeful conservatives during the reign of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI had gambled away their last pennies, is not only dead but buried six feet under;

(3) The Traditional Latin Liturgy, though by no means readily available to all who wish for it, is firmly rooted in the younger generations on all Continents and in nearly every Country, and shows no sign of budging.

There are few Traditionalist Clergy who would not be content to use a Missal from the early part of the 20th-Century, even as there are plenty who, in moments of honesty, and with trustworthy friends, will admit they have problems with the ersatz Holy Week and the Pope Saint John XXIII Missal. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis: If you have made a wrong turn, the only way to go forward is to go back. That is the fastest way to get on.

In this Article, I explained why it is legitimate, praiseworthy, and indeed necessary, to seek The Restoration Of The Fullness Of The Roman Liturgy that was lost in the Post-War period.

I am not touching on the more delicate and controversial question of what kind of permission, and from whom, is, or may be, required for utilising an earlier edition of the Missal.

It does not follow, simply because an earlier edition of the Missal is better, that anyone is “ipso facto” entitled to give himself permission to use it. But, regardless of permissions already in effect or still remaining to be ascertained, we should not see 1962 as a neighbourhood where Liturgical Life may settle down.

In comparison to the strife-ridden ghetto of The Novus Ordo, where opposing gangs of progressives and conservatives engage in a never-ending turf war, the 1962 status quo comes across as far safer, lovelier, more commodious. It is, nevertheless, a trailer park, a way station along the road to a better place.

The Assumption Of The Blessed Virgin Mary. Feast Day, Today, 15 August.

Text from The Saint Andrew Daily Missal,
unless stated otherwise.

The Assumption of The Blessed Virgin Mary.
Feast Day 15 August.

Double of The First-Class
with a Common Octave.

White Vestments.

On this Feast, the most ancient (6th-Century A.D.) and Solemn of The Cycle of Mary, The Church invites all her children in The Catholic World to unite their joy (Introit) and their gratitude (Preface) with those of The Angels, who praise The Son of God because of that day His Mother, Bodily and Spiritually, entered Heaven (Alleluia).

Admitted to the enjoyment of the delights of Eternal Contemplation, She chose at The Feet of The Master the better part, which shall not be taken away from Her (Gospel, Communion).

The Gospel of The Vigil was, indeed, formerly read after today's Gospel, in order to show that The Mother of Christ is happy among all others, because, better than all others: "She listened to The Word of God". This Word, The Word, The Divine Wisdom, which, under The Old Law, dwelt among the people of Israel (Epistle), dwelt in Mary, under The New Law.

“Mater Dolorosa”
(Mother of Sorrows).
Artist: Carlo Dolci (1616–1686).
Date: Circa 1650.
Current location: National Museum of Western Art,
Tokyo, Japan.
Source: Unknown.
(Wikimedia Commons)

Artist: René de Cramer.
“Copyright Brunelmar/Ghent/Belgium”.
Used with Permission.
Illustration: UNA VOCE OF ORANGE COUNTY

The Word became Incarnate in the womb of The Virgin, and now, amid the splendour of the Heavenly Sion, He fills Her with the delights of The Beatific Vision.

The Church on Earth, like Martha, has to care for the necessities of this present life, but she also, like her, invokes the help of Mary (Collect, Secret, Postcommunion).

A Procession has always been a part of The Feast of The Assumption. At Jerusalem, it was formed by the numerous Pilgrims who came to Pray at the tomb of The Blessed Virgin and who, thus, contributed to the Institution of this Solemnity.

The Clergy of Constantinople also held a Procession on The Feast of The Rest, or Assumption, of Mary. At Rome, from the 7th-Century A.D., to the 16th-Century, the Papal Cortege, in which the representatives of The Senate and people took part, went on this day from The Church of Saint John Lateran to that of Saint Mary Major. This Ceremony was called The Litany.

[On this occasion, they used to recite over the people, assembled for the Procession, the Collect for Assumption Day, which is first in The Sacramentary and mentions this Mystery, whilst our Collect of The Mass on 15 August was only The Second Collect and has no direct relation to The Feast.

This is The First Collect: "It is our duty to honour The Solemnity of this day, O Lord; The Holy Mother of God did, indeed, suffer temporal death, although the bonds of this death could not hold back Her, whose flesh formed The Body of Thy Son, Our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth . . ."]

It is in The Basilica of Saint Mary Major, Rome, that The Station is held at Christmas to Solemnise The Mystery, from which flowed all The Glories of The Virgin, and it is also there that was Solemnised The Assumption, in which they culminate. Mary received Jesus, when He came into this World, and it is Jesus Who receives Mary into Heaven.

Every Parish Priest Celebrates Mass for the people of his Parish.

The Introit for The Feast of The Assumption of The Blessed Virgin Mary, Gaudeámus omnes in Dómino . . . (Let us all rejoice in The Lord, . . .) is that of The Feast of Saint Agatha (5 February).

From the 11th-Century, this Introit was also used in seven other Masses which are in The Missal, among which are 15 August (today's Feast) and 1 November (Feast of All Saints).

Mass: Gaudeámus omnes.

Creed.

Preface: Of Our Blessed Lady. “Et te in Assumptióne”.