Ego vos elegi

Thoughts from a St. Louis seminarian

Adveniat Regnum Tuum!

Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine

I return at long last to the blogosphere, having been distracted first by the visit of my family members from out of town, then by an awful two days of either food poisoning or a stomach flu, as well as the rare opportunity to assist at four high Masses in the Tridentine rite in one week.  Three of these were solemn high Masses at which I was the subdeacon (Christ the King, All Souls, and the First Friday) and the last was a wedding Mass for two friends of mine. 

It is always an educational experience to attend the old form of the Roman Rite, but I was most particularly struck by the Requiem Mass we had on All Souls' Day.   The sanctuary of St. Francis de Sales Oratory is a blaze of splendid sculpture and bright color; gold is everywhere.  Usually, this is only reinforced by the ornate vestments worn by the Sacred Ministers.   But Wednesday night was a stark contrast, somber yet beautiful.  The veil of the tabernacle was a dark purple, the steps of the altar were draped in black carpet, and the celebrant, deacon, and myself were also clad in "customary shades of solemn black" as we made our way to the altar.  There we began the usual prayers, but they were noticeably shortened by the omission of Psalm 42.  Meanwhile, the choir began the Introit Requiem aeternam, the first of the many hauntingly and plaintively beautiful chants of that Mass. 

The rest of the Mass exhibited the same starkness.  The deacon omitted all of the usual kissings of the celebrant's hand which usually characterize high mass, and incense was used only at the offertory and the consecration,not at the Introit or the Gospel.  I chanted the Epistle not in the usual fancy tone, but in an austere recto tono.  Even the subdeacon's most memorable function, namely holding the paten aloft in a humeral veil throughout the Canon, was absent.  The kiss of peace before communion was omitted.  And the Mass ended in an equally abrupt fashion: after the usual post-communion prayer, we did not receive the usual Ite, missa est, but just heard the simple prayer Requiescant in pace, after which the celebrant proceeded with the last Gospel, not even giving the final blessing.  And of course throughout the Mass there were the many musical propers which have become so justly famous through the settings of great composers: the sequence Dies Irae, the Communion Antiphon Lux aeterna, and always striking to me, the Agnus Dei, not with the usual petitions miserere nobis/ dona nobis pacem, but rather dona eis requiem/dona eis requiem sempiternam. 

I haven't spent a whole lot of time on this blog discussing the liturgical reforms and the various things that might be said for and against them.  However, I couldn't help thinking as I attended that Mass that here was one aspect of our liturgical tradition which we really could have used to keep.  And in fact, much of it is still accessible to us in the reformed rites: black is still a completely acceptable liturgical color for Masses for the Dead, and most of the chant propers for the Requiem Mass are still available in the Graduale Romanum for any who want to use them (the whole world heard them at John Paul's funeral last April).  However, many of the distinctive things that made a Requiem Mass noticeably shorter by omission are no longer applicable, the Dies irae is only found in the appendix of the Breviary, the Agnus Dei in funerals is no longer specifically focused on praying for the dead, and the Requiem chants have given way to "On Eagle's Wings." 

There are reasons adduced for all of this, some of them understandable.  It was thought, I suppose, that the Dies irae gave people an overwhelmingly menacing view of judgment, that the use of black vestments seemed to be a gloomy fixation with death, and that a properly Christian funeral would be a celebration of the Resurrection.  I suppose it is thought that making funerals focus on hope and life, rather than mourning and penitence, would assist people in the grieving process.

Nonetheless, I fear that both humanly and spiritually we have lost out.  The fact is, Catholics should believe in the reality of judgment, but the disappearance of the Dies irae has meant that the liturgy hardly ever reminds us of it anymore, even at a time when it is entirely relevant.  I don't like to dwell on fire and brimstone any more than other people; however, the apocalyptic imagery with which the Dies irae begins is thoroughly Scriptural, drawing on sources as diverse as the Prophets, the Synoptics, St. Paul, and Revelation.  And if one actually reads all the way through, the Dies irae is really a beautiful expression of confidence in God's mercy and Christ's passion to save us from what our sins deserve.  This is true Christian hope, but today it's far too often traded for a cheap presumption that all of us are such good folks, God wouldn't dare pass judgment on our sins.

The same issues must be kept in mind in view of the current emphasis on Resurrection and the use of white vestments.  Yes, a celebration of Christian death must always focus on the Resurrection and realize that "for Your faithful people, life is changed, not ended."  But that quote actually is already found in the preface for the old Requiem Mass, whose texts certainly have plenty of assurances of the Resurrection, from Maccabees to various texts of St. Paul, to the Gospel from either the Bread of Life discourse or the raising of Lazarus.  The key, however, is that the Resurrection is an object of hope, not something presumed upon or already possessed.  The use of the penitential colors of black (or purple, which is also accpetable) serve to remind us that while Christ's Resurrection is our sure hope, nonetheless it is, like God's Kingdom, "already but not yet," and that while we entrust the deceased to God's mercy, we also recognize that they, like us, are sinners and very possibly in need of purification--and hence of our prayers. 

There is more that could be said on funeral rites, but it will have to await another day.  For the time being, I would simply say that those of us who will have the solemn duty of celebrating Masses for the Dead would do well to at least familiarize ourselves with the ethos of the traditional Requiem Mass, not just for the sake of liturgical history (which is worthwhile in itself) but also for the sake of learning from its centuries-old wisdom how to do justice to the mixture of mourning, consciousness of sin, judgment, and purification, trust in Christ's Redemption, present sharing in His suffering, and hope for a share in His Resurrection that should all be present in that complex reality which is the Catholic funeral. 

posted by: mhouser at 00:19 | link | comments (4) |