Sunday, February 05, 2012

A right rite of entrance


My attachment to Catholicism was (and is) very much intellectual and aesthetic, psychological, cultural and mythical. Certainly not so much moral :)  Consequently, --and this little project will certainly be free of consequence--since I had some free time last week, I restructured some of the flawed elements of the current Roman Mass to enhance flow, enrich meaning and to remove to another place and form the single most irritating flaw in the whole reformed rite, the Protestantoid "Penitential Rite".  The Liturgy was (and is?) for me, a Five, a kind of Glasperlenspiel. This format both reintroduces old material from the 16th century rite of Pius V and adds new material and structure to the 20th century rite of Paul VI.






Introitus

A bell is rung and the Introit chant is sung as the priest and ministers enter the sanctuary. The people stand.

Altaris veneratio

The priest and ministers bow deeply, kiss (and may incense) the altar. The priest then says quietly, with hands joined Oramus te.


We pray you O Lord by the merits of your saints
whose relics lie here,
of saint N (patron and/or the saint of the day)
and of all your Saints
that you would graciously pardon us all our sins,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.


Preces coram altari

The Introit completed, remaining before the altar --either ad orientem or ad populum-- he and the people make the Sign of the Cross and recite/chant aloud part of the psalm Judica me:

            In the name + of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
            Amen

            I will go to the altar of God
            the God of my gladness and joy

            O send forth your light and your truth
            Let these be my guide
            Let them lead me to your hold mountain
            to the place were you dwell
            Hope in God: I will praise him still,
            my Savior and my God.

            (moderately bowing)
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit
            as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be,
            world without end. Amen.

            I will go to the altar of God
            the God of my gladness and joy

Hands joined, he then prays aloud Aufer a nobis:

          Remove our iniquities, O Lord, that with pure minds
           we may be found worthy to enter the Holy of Holies,
           through Christ our Lord.
           Amen.


He then bows to the altar and goes to his chair; the other ministers take their places.

Salutatio

With hands extended, he greets the people


            The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
            the love of God
            and the communion of the Holy Spirit
            be with you all.
            And with your spirit.

and in Paschaltime, then he adds this greeting as well:



Alleluia! Christ has risen!
            He has risen indeed! Alleluia!

Petitio Sancti Spiritus

Hands joined, he recites/chants with the people the Veni Sancte verses:
Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful
and kindle in them your fire and your love
Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created
and you shall renew the face of the earth.              

Hands extended, he then prays this collect (1) aloud:

Almighty Father,
we pray that the Holy Spirit,
who is Himself the remission of all sins,
by coming near and graciously dwelling with us
may prepare our minds for the divine mysteries
and make us a perfect temple of His glory,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
            Amen

Kyrie


The Kyrie is recited/sung in ninefold, sixfold or troped form.


Gloria in excelsisThe Gloria is recited/sung on Sundays outside Advent and Lent, and on feasts and solemnities.

Collecta
The priest extends his hands in greeting and then prays the Collect of the Day

           The Lord be with you.
           And with your spirit.           Let us pray....Amen.
Then all take their seats for the Liturgy of the Word.

(1) A conflation of the collects for the Saturday before Pentecost and for the Conferral of Confirmation. The Petitio Sancti Spiritus was inspired by the Anglican Collect for Purity, which came from the medieval Sarum rite and is used at the opening of the BCP Communion.

PS. A pioneer of liturgical renewal, a Benedictine monk, made up this Latin joke Collect: Deus, qui per rubricistarum ordinem viam caeli impedisti da nobis, quaesumus, ipsis in mare rubrum detrusis, ut per aliam viam vitam aeternam consequamur. Per Christum Dominum nostrum. O God, who have blocked the way to heaven through the order of rubric-lovers, grant us, we pray that, they being drowned in a sea of red, we might find another way to eternal life. Through Christ our Lord.
________________________________

When I have some more empty time and inclination, the Penitential Rite in its new place and form.

7 comments:

OreamnosAmericanus said...

A personal quirk of mine. I never liked the Gloria. Never provoked either imagination, thought, image or feeling in me. Just some dead text you had get thru. Like the whole messy entrance rites of the Roman Mass. (Now the Te Deum, that was something you could engage with. But it's long. And stuck in the Office.)

Were it up to me, based on this quirk, on days when there was a Gloria, instead of the incensation of the altar, etc. at the very beginning, I'd have it done during the singing of the Gloria. Basically, honestly, to distract from the text's flatness and give the element some visual and olfactory oomph.

Reminds me of a wiseacre liturgist (not me) who said, We do the liturgy this way because that's how the Fathers of the Church did it. Why did the Fathers of the Church do it that way? Cause that's how they liked it.

Anonymous said...

Maybe it's not for me to know but - not knowing the regular mass, I don't know what you've changed.

Anonymous said...

Will your liturgical reforms prevent Hermann Hesse's anticipation of a dismal Exodus, "an exodus fail," if you will?

From wikipedia "Glass Bead Game":
»Castalia is home to an austere order of intellectuals with a twofold mission: to run boarding schools for boys, and to nurture and play the Glass Bead Game, whose exact nature remains elusive and whose devotees occupy a special school within Castalia known as Waldzell <. Wood Cell, prison; but sc maybe bkw L.S. law'd, or laud L.S.>.«


»The Glass Bead Game takes place at an unspecified date, centuries into the future. ... The setting is a fictional province of central Europe called Castalia, reserved by political decision for the life of the mind .«

»Playing the game well requires years of hard study of music, mathematics, and cultural history . Essentially the game is an abstract synthesis of all arts and sciences .«

»The novel is an example of a bildungsroman , following the life of a distinguished member of the Castalian Order, Joseph Knecht, whose surname translates as "servant" but can also mean "squire."«

»another meaningful friendship develops with Plinio Designori , a student from a politically influential family who is studying in Castalia as a guest. Knecht develops many of his personal views about what the good Castalia can do through vigorous debates with Designori, who views Castalia as an "ivory tower" with little to no impact on the outside world.«

»Although educated within Castalia, Knecht's path to "Magister Ludi" is atypical for the order, as he spends a significant portion of his time after graduation outside the boundaries of the province. His first such venture, to the Bamboo Grove, results in his learning Chinese«

Anonymous said...

in preparation for obedient will-to-power as Ego sum quis ego sum.>

»Knecht does the unthinkable: he resigns as Magister Ludi and asks to leave the order, ostensibly to become of value and service to the larger culture. The heads of the order deny his request to leave, but Knecht departs Castalia anyway, initially taking a job as a tutor to his childhood friend Designori's energetic and strong-willed son, Tito. Only a few days later, the story ends abruptly with Knecht drowning in a mountain lake while attempting to follow Tito on a swim for which Knecht was unfit. «



P.S. I see that the character "Fritz Tegularius" is based on Nietzsche. Sc as an arius or high-class Edel, gentryman, sent into exile (Tegul rescrambled into Gelut)? past his expiry date "Frist"? Nietzsche's kairos has gone? But some[I am] are born[arboring, tree-ing] posthumously!
er

Anonymous said...

... or maybe Moses is a super-natural swimmer? ... Jesus could have walk'd across the sea of reeds, eh?

Anonymous said...

in preparation for obedient will-to-power as Ego sum quis ego sum.>

»Knecht does the unthinkable: he resigns as Magister Ludi and asks to leave the order, ostensibly to become of value and service to the larger culture. The heads of the order deny his request to leave, but Knecht departs Castalia anyway, initially taking a job as a tutor to his childhood friend Designori's energetic and strong-willed son, Tito. Only a few days later, the story ends abruptly with Knecht drowning in a mountain lake while attempting to follow Tito on a swim for which Knecht was unfit. «



P.S. I see that the character "Fritz Tegularius" is based on Nietzsche. Sc as an arius or high-class Edel, gentryman, sent into exile (Tegul rescrambled into Gelut)? past his expiry date "Frist"? Nietzsche's kairos has gone? But some[I am] are born[arboring, tree-ing] posthumously!

Anonymous said...

in preparation for obedient will-to-power as Ego sum quis ego sum.>

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