Posted on 01/30/2005 6:27:26 PM PST by Catholic54321
MAPLE LAKE, Minn. - The ancient Roman Catholic ritual in which someone continuously adores the Eucharist, the wafter at the heart of the Catholic Mass, is making a comeback in St. Timothy's Catholic Church here, and nearly 40 other churches in the state.
"It's a bottom-up phenomenon," said John Boyle, a professor of theology and Catholic studies at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. "It's been remarkable over the past 20 years to watch it grow, especially the past 10 years."
The practice is known as "perpetual adoration" and was once the purview of nuns and monks, but now in churches from International Falls to Sleepy Eye candles and lights blaze through the night for the faithful.
On a recent morning at St. Timothy's, there's a neighborliness and informality to the ritual. Howard Selander, 77, kneels while his wife, Lucille, 72, chats with Dale Bothun, a teacher who had the previous shift before they begin.
They tend the candles, do a rosary and pray for the sick then stair straight at the Eucharist, the blessed bread Catholics believe is the body of Jesus which is enshrined in a glass case flanked by flickering candles. It's 12:38 a.m.
"Oh my Jesus, forgive us our sins. Save us from the fires of Hell," Lucille Selander said, rocking as she says the first of many repetitions of the prayer. "Lead all souls to heaven, especially those most in need of thy mercy."
The Selanders were probably not the only people performing the ritual in Minnesota that morning. The Rev. Victor Warkulwiz, a Pennsylvania priest who travels the country to help start adoration programs, said the ritual is making a comeback in the state.
"The Archdiocese of Minneapolis and St. Paul ... probably has the most chapels of perpetual adoration of any archdiocese in the country. It's one of the most fruitful areas for this anywhere," he said.
Warkulwiz has been in Minnesota every weekend this month.
People from around the world call Minnesotans for tips in starting their own programs. Peggy Powell, coordinator of one of the state's longest-running adorations at Epiphany Catholic Church in Coon Rapids, has taken some of those calls.
"I think we're going to have an explosion this year," Powell said. "People are just calling out of the woodwork. It's amazing."
Things are more formal at Epiphany in Coon Rapids; there's no chitchat in the chapel where Paulette Nelson, 62, has a weekly morning adoration on Tuesdays.
Her voice drops to a hush as she enters and signs the log book. She genuflects at the back of the chapel, bows her head and kisses the chapel floor.
"It's just as if Jesus were standing there," Nelson said, reflecting the Catholic view that Jesus is actually present. "You wouldn't go in and walk by him."
Throughout the Roman Catholic church's long history, perpetual adoration has rarely been widespread, so religious studies experts consider it astounding that it's made a resurgence in Minnesota. Parishioners call it miraculous.
"It's very interesting. I don't know what to make of it," said Randall Balmer, who heads the Religious Studies Department at Barnard College in New York. Balmer partly attributed the movement to the conservative influence of Pope John Paul.
In 1991, the pope began perpetual adoration at the Vatican and urged parishes everywhere to do the same.
The practice of perpetual adoration flowered in the Middle Ages in some European areas, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia. For most of the past century many U.S. parishes had certain times for round-the-clock adoration, but didn't do it year-round.
There are now 728 adoration chapels in the United States, according to the Real Presence Association of Chicago, a Catholic nonprofit that tracks and promotes adoration.
The Rev. Thomas Wilson, director of vocations for the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, said the number of Minnesota chapels that practice the ritual has doubled in the past 10 years or so.
Warkulwiz and the Real Presence Association's Carol Seydel both said that Minneapolis-St. Paul's archbishop, the Rev. Harry Flynn, has been a strong supporter of the practice.
But the Rev. Joseph Johnson, assistant chancellor for the archdiocese, said there was also a divine influence. He said parishioners must take the lead in making adoration work, regardless if church leaders support the practice.
"This is not something the priest can walk in and say, 'Gee, folks, this is what we're going to do,'" Johnson said. "This is not for the weak-kneed. It takes sacrifice and commitment."
"why not just compare the Tridentine Mass with the Novus Ordo Mass."
In twenty-one words or less? Actually, you should read the Archbishop's study--it's pretty enlightening. To sum it all up--the Novus Ordo is theologically Protestant and the Traditional Mass is theologically Catholic. That is the ugly truth. Bugnini's concoction in fact did exactly what Luther did, INCLUDING tossing out the Offertory, taking the words "mysterium fidei" and "pro multis" out of the Consecration, and converting what had been a propitiatory sacrifice into one solely of thanksgiving and praise in violation of Trent.
Excuuuse me?!?!?!
That claim is utter nonsense! How can you even make it with a straight face? How can you sit there and expect me to believe anything you have to say when you try to slip a piece of absurdity like that past me?
Please tell me that was just a brain-fart ... just an accidental slip of the fingers.
Please.
You've just demonstrated that the words "Mysterum Fidei" are actually not part of the consecration, but were tacked on after the elevation.
The absurdity is yours. It's true the ICEL took the words "pro multis" out first in emulation of Luther. But Rome has put its imprimatur on the change and allowed this to stand.
Your problem is that you believe the Latin original matters. It has long since been superceded by facts on the ground. And the facts on the ground are the Masses actually attended by people in the real world, not a Mass that exists nowhere except in Mother Angelica's monastery.
Pyro: The way I read the Latin, it seems to me that "Mysterium Fidei" is describing the entire consecration. ICEL, of course, deliberately breaks this up.
This same issue came up on another thread. Someone else tried to make the claim that "for many" and "for all" meant the same thing, since according to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, "for all" really meant "for all the elect," with "the elect" understood. Here is what I answered:
____________________________________
Let's see if I've got this right. The Church took a perfectly clear meaning and decided to make it ambiguous. Doesn't this strike you as strange? Why would churchmen do this? Why change the words of Jesus Himself?
You must admit the people who did this knew they would raise a few eyebrows, would even raise a howl of protest not unlike the old "Filioque" dispute. But still, they did it anyway. And when people complained to Rome, the Holy See made matters worse by allowing the change.
So there had to be an agenda. They took something clear and made it fuzzy. They knew they would be charged with distorting the meaning of Jesus--but they did it anyway. They knew it was the most sacred part of the text--the origin for which went back to apostolic times--but still they did it.
And not only this. But they remove tabernacles from a place of centrality, they eliminate genuflections, they prohibit kneeling for Communion, they insist on Communion in the hands, they tear out communion rails, they place teddy bears on the altar and dress up as Santa for Christmas--and still people like you will say there is no agenda.
Meanwhile the Pope offers heathens our altars at Assisi, heretics are elevated to the cardinalate, an encyclical is published which states that "Man is the path the Church must follow," and on and on. And still you say there is no agenda. Of course there is an agenda.
You will never admit it, but any one with common sense understands what it is. It is to destroy the old religion and institute the new. But still you will deny it. You will see the evidence of catastrophe everywhere, the statistical declines that correlate perfectly with the systematic destruction of Tradition--but still you will deny the obvious.
1) My "own experience", which you so blithely dismissed, is more common than you think. I, for one, think that's a good thing. 2) I quoted you the Latin Novus Ordo. Even you cannot deny that pro multis is right there in black and white.
3) Here in the real world, "badly translated" does not mean "left out". Deal with it.
4) You have been reduced to bandying semantics. If you wish to continue doing so, you will have to do it with someone else. You may have the last word, if you like.
Any thread on Roman Catholic devotion is, to the schizzies, just another advertising opportunity.
I kneel for communion and receive ONLY on the tongue and so do my wife and kids. Many who attend Novus Ordo Masses do so as well. In my hometown N.O. parish, the tabernacle is right where it belongs at the center of an altar attached to the wall behind that altar. The NO Mass is said on the usual "hot dog stand" in front of that altar. The Church itself, built in 1928, was totally restored in 2004. Despite some expressed desire by numerous parishioners, an altar rail was not newly installed but pews cluttering the altar area were removed which would make that more possible in the future. The chairs of priest and servers were moved to the side where they belong from their prior inappropriate position on the congregation side of the tabernacle.
Your quite reasonable problems with language in American N. O. liturgy should be expressed to the execrable Bishop Imesch of Joliet, Illinois, who, as head of ICEL has been fighting guerrilla warfare against JP II and his appointees on the linguistic atrocities perpetrated by ICEL. I would prefer that the discipline of Imesch be as vigorous as the discipline of your deceased and excommunicated hero but I don't make the decisions and neither do you.
This Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger whom you favorably cite: Would he be JP II's right-hand man who has never objected to the justice meted out to Marcel? Just asking!
I don't mistake you for an apologist for the ICEL at all. You are somebody who attends the Novus Ordo--and that tells me all I need to know. Whether you kneel or not for Communion, or whether you take Communion on the tongue, is beside the point.
And you are wrong to imagine that "pro multis" has been "badly translated." If the phrase has not been honestly translated, then there has been a conscious decision to ignore what Jesus actually said. That's leaving his words out. You can rationalize this any way you like--but it's still a deliberate deception--of the sort that permeates the New Mass.
This was done by Bugger Bugnini and his Very Best Pal, Rembert (and others on the Consilium.)
The Mysterium Fide is chanted, and the chanted response is Mortem Tuum annunciamus Domine, ...(etc.)
It was built into the NO as an acclamation/response after the Consecration.
And it was a lousy idea.
How can we make this into a "shaming" phrase?--or is it better that you have a scarlet N.O. emblazoned on your chest?
As for the scarlet N.O. ... Matt 5:11-12
;'}
The placement in text certainly is referent to the Consecration, or the re-presented Sacrifice of Calvary, agreed.
But the placement in text is severely weakened by the 1) Elevation and 2) genuflection which take place after the Consecration. In other words, the placement 'in action' seriously impairs the intended effect of the placement 'in text.'
Here is only one instance wherein the NO's clumsy, committee-engineered "effect" is at best weak and at worst meaningless.
There are countless others, beginning with the license for potois instead of Latin.
"Christ is right there on the Altar, why are we blithering about end-times?"
Why, indeed--if not to subvert the faith?
"Any thread on Roman Catholic devotion is, to the schizzies, just another advertising opportunity"
Some might call it advertising; I call it getting the word out.
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