Universalis, your very own breviary in pixels...

Tuesday 28 October 2008

New dismissal options..... hmmm

Fr Keyes IIRC, once bemoaned the fact that an orthodox, liturgically astute pastor who follows one who is more... loosey-goosey? always, and unfairly, has to educate people who think the changes are just "Father's way" just as what occurred under the old regime was THAT "Father's way."
(I have mentioned at LitCom meetings that we are doing the Mass and our people a disservice when we try to instruct, and piggy-back parochial rubrics on genuine ones, but it did not fall on responsive ears.)
The new dismissal options will punch a new hole in one of our parish's many and large cans o' worms, one that is already somewhat lacking in structural integrity.

Along with "Ite, missa est," the Latin phrase now translated as "The Mass is ended, go in peace," he said the new options are:
-- "Ite ad Evangelium Domini annuntiandum" (Go and announce the Gospel of the Lord).
-- "Ite in pace, glorificando vita vestra Dominum" (Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life).
-- "Ite in pace" (Go in peace).

Our poor, ultra-conscientious, transitional deacon routinely and unchangingly uses a current, perfectly appropriate optional form for the dismissal and gets little response, and many confused looks, and I suspect, our parish personality being what it is, a certain amount of vocal flack after the event.
He is the scapegoat for the "sins" of our permanent deacon, and the latter's .... creativity? Flexibility? Wanton disregard for the text of the Missal?
Whatever.
Not only does he take a text and add to it at whim, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord... and your neighbor; but he will wax poetic, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord... and feed your neighbor; and invent new variations on the Great Commission, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord... and go, Fighting Irish! ; and offer his own, self-composed Te Deum in thanks for blessings received, Go in peace to love and serve the Lord... and you can put it on the scoreboard!!!
So people just basically give up.... heck, since they're not planning to stick around for the priest's departure from the sanctuary, much less the final hymn, why even bother with their response?
My impulse, when the performer of the other half of a ritual, whether theatrical or liturgical, deliberately improvises his lines, is to improvise mine.
I have so far resisted, when EMHCs make up their own dialogue, when priests or deacons prefer their own invention to what they have received, what WE have received....
But someday they may hear a loud Hallelujah!, or that's righteous, brother, you tell'em!... or maybe just, Save me, Jesus!
I think I've whined about this on my blog before, sorry.

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