Wednesday Liturgy: Follow-up: Shifting or Substituting the Sunday Liturgy
ROME, JAN. 20, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Answered by Legionary of Christ Father Edward McNamara, professor of liturgy at the Regina Apostolorum university.
Related to our column on shifting the Sunday liturgy (see Jan. 6), a priest residing in the United States asked the following:
"I searched the GIRM [General Instruction of the Roman Missal] for some light on the patronal celebration of the feast on a Sunday. In Mumbai, India, we observe the solemnity of the feast of the patron saint on the following Sunday so that the entire parish can take part in the celebration.
"I am at a parish dedicated to St. George, and we are celebrating the diamond jubilee of the parish. I suggested to the pastor to have the celebration of the feast, which falls on April 23, on the following Sunday, April 26. He wants to know how it can be done. Could you throw some light on this?"
Actually, this question is not addressed in the GIRM but in No. 58 of the introduction to the Roman calendar published in 1969.
This document states: "For the pastoral advantage of the people, it is permissible to observe on the Sundays in Ordinary Time those celebrations that fall during the week and have special appeal to the devotion of the faithful, provided the celebrations take precedence over these Sundays in the Table of Liturgical Days. The Mass for such celebrations may be used at all the Masses at which a congregation is present."
Therefore, it is legitimate to transfer the celebration of a parish's patron saint (which has the rank of solemnity in the parish itself) to the following Sunday if this is a Sunday of ordinary time.
In the concrete case mentioned by our reader, however, the Sunday following April 23 always falls in Eastertide or, as will occur in 2011, 2038 and 2095, is Easter Sunday itself. This Sunday, therefore, always has a higher rank in the table of liturgical days than the feast of the patron saint. Thus, in this case it is not possible to transfer the feast to the following Sunday.
It is still possible to organize other activities of popular devotion on this Sunday if this is the only day that people can gather, but the Mass must be that of the corresponding Sunday of Easter.
Another priest raised an intriguing question to the follow-up article on Communion under both species: "Further to the question/answer of Jan. 6, as 'the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ are present in both the consecrated bread and wine,' is there anything -- apart from the fact that 'it isn't done' -- against administering only the Blood of Christ, and not the Body of Christ? I never see the question raised this way round."
I would say that, strictly speaking, this could be done. It is quite regularly done in case of those who are intolerant to wheat and to those incapable of receiving solid food. I would also suppose that it could be done if, in admittedly highly unusual circumstances, a group of isolated Christians found themselves with little bread and a lot of altar wine.
As far as I know, there is no explicit prohibition against this, probably because nobody ever thought of doing it before. But the law presumes that it is not done and that if Communion is given under one species, this species is ordinarily the species of bread.
There are myriad practical reasons that justify the Church's present custom of not distributing only the species of wine, but I think that the reasons go beyond the practical and the budgetary.
Many Old Testament types of the Eucharist, such as the manna in the desert to which Our Lord himself refers to in Chapter 6 of the Gospel according to John, plus the reference to the Eucharist as the "breaking of the bread" found in the Acts of the Apostles, indicate that there is a clear preference toward the species of bread from the very beginning.
Likewise, the species of wine is not easily conserved, and distributing only the species of wine would have made the development of Eucharistic devotion and adoration almost impossible.
I think we can therefore conclude that the prevalence of distributing the consecrated bread rather than just the consecrated wine is a practice guided by the Holy Spirit for the greater good of the Church.
Related to our column on shifting the Sunday liturgy (see Jan. 6), a priest residing in the United States asked the following:
"I searched the GIRM [General Instruction of the Roman Missal] for some light on the patronal celebration of the feast on a Sunday. In Mumbai, India, we observe the solemnity of the feast of the patron saint on the following Sunday so that the entire parish can take part in the celebration.
"I am at a parish dedicated to St. George, and we are celebrating the diamond jubilee of the parish. I suggested to the pastor to have the celebration of the feast, which falls on April 23, on the following Sunday, April 26. He wants to know how it can be done. Could you throw some light on this?"
Actually, this question is not addressed in the GIRM but in No. 58 of the introduction to the Roman calendar published in 1969.
This document states: "For the pastoral advantage of the people, it is permissible to observe on the Sundays in Ordinary Time those celebrations that fall during the week and have special appeal to the devotion of the faithful, provided the celebrations take precedence over these Sundays in the Table of Liturgical Days. The Mass for such celebrations may be used at all the Masses at which a congregation is present."
Therefore, it is legitimate to transfer the celebration of a parish's patron saint (which has the rank of solemnity in the parish itself) to the following Sunday if this is a Sunday of ordinary time.
In the concrete case mentioned by our reader, however, the Sunday following April 23 always falls in Eastertide or, as will occur in 2011, 2038 and 2095, is Easter Sunday itself. This Sunday, therefore, always has a higher rank in the table of liturgical days than the feast of the patron saint. Thus, in this case it is not possible to transfer the feast to the following Sunday.
It is still possible to organize other activities of popular devotion on this Sunday if this is the only day that people can gather, but the Mass must be that of the corresponding Sunday of Easter.
Another priest raised an intriguing question to the follow-up article on Communion under both species: "Further to the question/answer of Jan. 6, as 'the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ are present in both the consecrated bread and wine,' is there anything -- apart from the fact that 'it isn't done' -- against administering only the Blood of Christ, and not the Body of Christ? I never see the question raised this way round."
I would say that, strictly speaking, this could be done. It is quite regularly done in case of those who are intolerant to wheat and to those incapable of receiving solid food. I would also suppose that it could be done if, in admittedly highly unusual circumstances, a group of isolated Christians found themselves with little bread and a lot of altar wine.
As far as I know, there is no explicit prohibition against this, probably because nobody ever thought of doing it before. But the law presumes that it is not done and that if Communion is given under one species, this species is ordinarily the species of bread.
There are myriad practical reasons that justify the Church's present custom of not distributing only the species of wine, but I think that the reasons go beyond the practical and the budgetary.
Many Old Testament types of the Eucharist, such as the manna in the desert to which Our Lord himself refers to in Chapter 6 of the Gospel according to John, plus the reference to the Eucharist as the "breaking of the bread" found in the Acts of the Apostles, indicate that there is a clear preference toward the species of bread from the very beginning.
Likewise, the species of wine is not easily conserved, and distributing only the species of wine would have made the development of Eucharistic devotion and adoration almost impossible.
I think we can therefore conclude that the prevalence of distributing the consecrated bread rather than just the consecrated wine is a practice guided by the Holy Spirit for the greater good of the Church.
posted by Chipi Buenafe at
1:47 PM
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