Archbishop Gaenswein has spoken about the grief felt by Pope Emeritus Benedict at the decision of his successor to attack those who make use of the ancient rites of the Roman Church.
As I watched just now the Funeral transmitted from Rome, I was reminded of an event in the history of S Thomas's Church in Oxford, my last Anglican priestly responsibility.
It had occurred, years before my arrival, when my predecessor Dr Trevor Jalland, Oxford's Bampton lecturer, expert on S Leo the Great, and on the history of the Papacy, had died. The funeral Mass was offered by another great Anglican scholar, Fr Michael Moreton, Prebendary of the Cathedral Church of S Peter in Exeter.
Years later, Michael explained to me his decision (despite the possibility of complaints from the Great and the Good who seem always so ready to put the boot in) to use the Canon Romanus at Fr Trevor's Funeral.
"He was a Patristic Scholar and I decided to give him a Patristic Eucharistic Prayer".
We must never forget Pope Benedict's insistence on Continuity.
9 comments:
Pope Benedict was a shining light when it came to the Sacred Litury. Now the lamps have gone out with the current occupant of the Trhone of St. Peter. Hopefully, very soon, the lights will shine again.
The text and music of the Funeral of Emeritus Pope Benedict can be downloaded here
https://archive.ccwatershed.org/media/pdfs/23/01/04/21-17-51_0.pdf
Latin, with English and Italian translations.
Sadly Pope Benedict was not afforded the same courtesy and had to make do with Eucharistic Prayer number 3. I suppose it could have been worse. They might have tried to get away with
using EP number 2!
Such a pity he was given EP III, the first Pope whose obsequies did not include the Roman Canon, even in its more recent recension.
Rumour has it Eucharistic Prayer ii was used to speed up John Paul I 's funeral due to heavy rain?
Let Benedict speak for himself:
"It is precisely in this combination of continuity and discontinuity at different levels that the very nature of true reform consists. In this process of innovation in continuity we must learn to understand more practically than before that the Church's decisions on contingent matters - for example, certain practical forms of liberalism or a free interpretation of the Bible - should necessarily be contingent themselves, precisely because they refer to a specific reality that is changeable in itself. It was necessary to learn to recognize that in these decisions it is only the principles that express the permanent aspect, since they remain as an undercurrent, motivating decisions from within.
On the other hand, not so permanent are the practical forms that depend on the historical situation and are therefore subject to change." ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO THE ROMAN CURIA OFFERING THEM HIS CHRISTMAS GREETINGS, Thursday, 22 December 2005
https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/speeches/2005/december/documents/hf_ben_xvi_spe_20051222_roman-curia.html
Btw, Eucharistic Prayer III was previously used at the funeral of Pope John Paul I in 1978:
https://youtu.be/r-HklLgTu6E?t=113
Vere Sanctus es, Dómine,
et mérito te laudat omnis a te cóndita creatúra,
quia per Fílium tuum,
Dóminum nostrum Iesum Christum,
Spíritus Sancti operánte virtúte,
vivíficas et sanctíficas univérsa,
et pópulum tibi congregáre non désinis,
et cet.
I regret to dissent on the question of Pope Benedict's funeral. It seems to me that while pope, Benedict surely had the option to celebrate himself the Apostolic Mass (but never did as pontiff---at least not in public) and to have been more muscular with his own example of fidelity to the Mass of Tradition. But he did not---out of fear under threats, or out of a hubristic commitment to show to the world that the "Great Council" was not a total failure, we don't know. So, that he would have a rather lack-luster funeral under a soulless modern "tent" in front of the empty grand Mother Church of Christendom (exactly according to Francis's sensibilities) with a synthetically-composed Eucharistic Prayer should neither surprise nor distress us. He, sadly, died in the sad ecclesial world he very actively (apparently with subsequent regrets) helped create.
Very well said.
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