The Feast of the Chair of S Peter was, this year, superseded and obliterated, according to the modern rubrics, by Mass and Office of last Sunday. Yet the Holy Father alluded to it in his address. Laurence Hemming's book Worship as a Revelation suggested that the modern fashion of permitting on each day one unitary celebration (instead of commemorations, Vespers a capitulo .... etc.) is an impoverishment in both diachronic and synchronic terms.
Perhaps the Sovereign Pontiff agrees with that.
The Feast of the Chair of S Peter was, this year, superseded and obliterated, according to the modern rubrics, by Mass and Office of last Sunday.
ReplyDeleteThis is correct, Father, but the status of even the commemorations had changed even before the reforms of 1970. So, in 1955, there would have been a commemoration at I Vespers, Lauds, Mass, and II Vespers, with the proper Last Gospel at Mass. By 1962 we had lost proper Last Gospels, and the commemoration at Mass would only have occurred at Low Mass. Contrariwise, before 1913, the feast (in fact, all double feasts) would have been kept, with commemoration, proper Last Gospel, and ninth lesson at Matins of the Sunday.
It's been a bumpy ride...