 22/07/2010 22:03 |
|
| | | OFFLINE | | Post: 20.649
Post: 3.287 | Registrato il: 28/08/2005
Registrato il: 20/01/2009 | Administratore | Utente Master | |
|
But what's wrong anyway if the Pope
says the traditional Mass in private -
and why is Fr. Lombardi so defensive?
On a French site, I have just found a re-post of the following CNS story (that I didn't see earlier) giving a rather full account of Fr. Lombardi's (to me, incomprehensible) denial that the Pope says the traditional Mass in private at all!
VATICAN CITY, July 17 (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI concelebrates his daily morning Mass in Italian using the current edition of the Roman Missal, the Vatican spokesman said.
Claims that the Pope celebrates his private Mass using the Tridentine rite are incorrect, Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi told Catholic News Service.
The Tridentine Mass is the Latin-language liturgy that predates the Second Vatican Council; it was last revised in the 1962 edition of the Roman Missal.
Less than 10 days after Pope Benedict July 7 issued his letter and norms providing greater opportunity for the celebration of the Tridentine Mass, news reports claimed Pope Benedict already had been celebrating the old rite privately.
"The confusion probably was caused by our footage of the pope celebrating facing the altar, which is due to the fact that the altar is against the wall," in the private chapel of the Apostolic Palace, Father Lombardi said.
With the altar against the wall, the concelebrants in the private chapel end up having their backs toward the congregation during the eucharistic prayer. The congregation at the morning Mass generally is made up of the Pope's valet and the consecrated women who staff the papal apartment.
The images Father Lombardi referred to were released by the Vatican to coincide with celebrations of Pope Benedict's 80th birthday April 16. Father Lombardi heads the Vatican Television Center, which produced the footage, as well as serving as director of the Vatican press office and Vatican Radio.
Father Lombardi also said the fact that the Pope's two private secretaries concelebrate the Mass with him each morning "obviously means he is using the new Missal," since the Tridentine Mass strictly limits concelebration.
At public Masses with an international congregation, Pope Benedict uses the post-Vatican II Mass with most of the prayers in Latin. However, on occasions such as the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, which is considered a Rome diocesan celebration although there is an international congregation, the Pope recites the prayers in Italian.
It's worse than the earlier stories I saw and ignored. It is too defensive, unnecessarily so, and illogical - almost as if it would be a shocking offense on the part of the Pope to ever say the Mass in the old way, even in private, or to even suggest that he does so! Why would a practice he himself legitimized three years ago for the entire Church suddenly become objectionable, questionable, nay unthinkable!, if he followed his own Motu Proprio in private?
And that, I believe, is the worst objection I have to the fact that Fr. Lombardi even felt it was necessary to comment on the matter. Especially since it also indicates he felt a need to counter Mons. Fellay's personal speculation about it.
Fr. Lombardi just gave all the uncooperative bishops a reason to say - three years after Summorum Pontificum and the review that the Pope is asking of each bishop - "If the Pope himself does not say the old Mass, why should we, or, for that matter, allow any backward priest to say it in my diocese?"
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 23/07/2010 00:11] |
| |
|
| |
|
|