From the department of liturgy disinformation

I won't try to defend the diocese, which abuts mine, but I would like to address the issue a bit.

There are about 190 dioceses (including the Eastern Rites and the Military Diocese) in the U.S. and each one of them will be able to write its own interpretation of Summorum Pontificum.

In some the Ordinary will do the writing, in others, a professionally educated academician will have the task, in others, some of them quite small and rural, a volunteer or underling might write it.

The chances of the 190 dioceses having the same interpretation of what Pope Benedict has already decided is pretty slim. In fact, I don't believe that he made any requests for local interpretations other than by the local Pastors.

Heckuva way to run a railroad, isn't it?

I fear that by the time the 1962 Latin Mass begins to be commonly celebrated (in a few years), we will find that it may have as many variations as does the Novus Ordo Mass.

Those of us looking for adherence to the GIRM and for reverence may find that we will be looking in the wrong place, again.

But you can at the very least expect that whomever writes in an official capacity for the diocese to have a basic and fundamental understanding of the Eucharist. Were I her superior, I would fire her on the spot.

I've deliberately refused to learn anything about liturgy because what little I know already gets violated regularly and I would only create more trouble. (Children being at their liturgy of the Word so long that they miss the liturgy of the Eucharist for example).

Learning that purgatory still exists despite the votive candles being gone and that contraception is evil despite clergy not mentioning the issue already makes me enough of a freak as it is.

Jeff, have you tried abandoning your skepticism despite its usual conformance with reality? Pope John Paul II invites us to
stop... putting the heart in a state of continual and irreversible suspicion.

This reminds me of the Wizard of Oz, manipulating the controls to make the lights flash and smoke billow, in a last desperate attempt to intimidate Dorothy et al. after Toto pulled back the curtain to expose the old man behind it. Seriousy though, it seems to me that one of the greatest obstacles to the "reform of the reform" will be liturgical "experts", including many clergy, whose academic credentials, at least as to liturgical matters, rest on the speculation that passed for scholarship over the last forty years. For many ordinary people, what they know about the Mass and experience in its celebration comes from these questionable sources. But since it's all they know, it will not be easy to overcome their comfortable ignorance, especially when the "experts" dispense more of the same to maintain the facade of authority.

Which reminds me of the old question: "What's the difference between a liturgist and a terrorist?"

"But you can at the very least expect that whomever writes in an official capacity for the diocese to have a basic and fundamental understanding of the Eucharist."

True!

But I find it most interesting that after almost 30 days, less than 30 U.S. Dioceses have been heard from, and many of those unofficially by newspaper reports.

Maybe they haven't opened their mail from Rome yet.

Actually, I thinks it means that the vast majority of the people in the chanceries don't really care and if and when they are called upon to write a diocesan reaction statement, more progressive theologies will be placed on exhibit.

Lynn wrote: Which reminds me of the old question: "What's the difference between a liturgist and a terrorist?"

Oooh... I know that one! You can negotiate with a terrorist.

I was intrigued by this part:

"Today, communicants receive the Eucharist under the forms of both bread and wine, the Body and Blood of Christ. In the old Mass, due to medieval plagues and lack of public health practices, communicants could receive only the Body of Christ."

Surely a trained liturgist [gag] would know that what she has just written is heresy. I wonder if the Bishop of Winona is aware that he has a heretic on his payroll?

"Today, communicants receive the Eucharist under the forms of both bread and wine, the Body and Blood of Christ. ..."

FWIW, Utraquism, well explained at http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15244b.htm , is an age old heresy which most often rears its head at 'First Communion,' but which also has found its way into almnost every Parish in the US.