Hail Mary in Prayer of the Faithful

[Southern Comfort]

But for the life of me I can't remember what happened with the propers - I suspect they may have been chanted to psalm tones.

Except at Easter and Christmas, when the full Gregorian propers were sung, in the parish I grew up in they used Dom Laurence Bévenot's tones (not his psalm tones — he wrote those much later) for chanting the propers — normally the G minor set.

[John Ainslie]

All kinds of other things happened during Mass, too. For example, people often went to confession during it.

...a practice which, incredibly, has been revived by the PP in a parish near me (not mine, DG) for pre-Christmas and pre-Easter. As already said, practice is not always a safe criterion.

More seriously, the relationship between the liturgy and pious practices is a matter of importance. It was the subject of the Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy issued by the Congregation for Divine Worship in 2001. In paragraph 11 it states:

The liturgical renewal of the Council set out to promote the participation of the people in the celebration of the Liturgy, at certain times and places (through hymns, active participation, and lay ministries), which had previously given rise to forms of prayer alternative to, or substitutive of, the liturgical action itself. The faithful should be made conscious of the preeminence of the Liturgy over any other possible form of legitimate Christian prayer. While sacramental actions are necessary to life in Christ, the various forms of popular piety are properly optional.

(The italics are in the original.)

One more paragraph from that instruction is worth quoting:

48. History principally shows that the correct relationship between Liturgy and popular piety begins to be distorted with the attenuation among the faithful of certain values essential to the Liturgy itself. The following may be numbered among the causes giving rise to this:

• a weakened awareness or indeed a diminished sense of the Paschal mystery, and of its centrality for the history of salvation, of which the Liturgy is an actualization. Such inevitably occurs when the piety of the faithful, unconscious of the "hierarchy of truths", imperceptibly turns towards other salvific mysteries in the life of Christ, of the Blessed Virgin Mary or indeed of the Angels and Saints;
• a weakening of a sense of the universal priesthood in virtue of which the faithful offer "spiritual sacrifices pleasing to God, through Jesus Christ" (1 Pt 2,5; Rm 12,1), and, according to their condition, participate fully in the Church's worship. This is often accompanied by the phenomenon of a Liturgy dominated by clerics who also perform the functions not reserved to them and which, in turn, causes the faithful to have recourse to pious exercises through which they feel a sense of becoming active participants;
• lack of knowledge of the language proper to the Liturgy - as well as its signs, symbols and symbolic gestures - causing the meaning of the celebration to escape the greater understanding of the faithful. Such can engender a sense of being extraneous to the liturgical action, and hence are easily attracted to pious exercises whose language more easily approaches their own cultural formation, or because certain forms of devotions respond more obviously to daily life.

'...lack of knowledge of the language...' - are you listening, Vox Clara?

[NorthernTenor]

I referred to the private use of Marian prayers by the laity during celebration of the older form.......

The word to emphasise there, NT, is private. John Ainslie has mentioned the public prayers after Low Mass.
That some people prayed the Rosary during Mass is certainly a fact. Yet by no means all. Even as a little child, I had a picture book Missal and my mother and father took me through
the action of the Mass, while themselves, following every word in parallel Latin/English pew editions of the Missal. (These I still possess.) Attending the Missa Cantata, we all sang the Ordinary of the Mass in dialogue with the choir ...... and the responses to the dialogues with the celebrant / Amen to the orations and Great Amen etc… Didn't a monk of Ampleforth have something to do with this by founding a Society in 1929..... the fruit of Papal documents of 1910 and 1928? Congregations were praying the Mass in song in the 1950s - not simply praying privately at Mass.

And therein lies my point, Fr. Conclusion of the bidding prayers with an 'Ave Maria' gives us continuity with previous practice in a manner whose public, collective nature is more in tune with the aspirations of the liturgical movement and the ethos of the new form of the rite. It seems sensible to me to attempt to strike a balance between that ethos and the greater liturgical continuity; and I lack the emotional investment in liturgical reform or opposition to it that seems to make this difficult for some here.

Also, I'm aware from secondary sources and others' recollections that congregations frequently prayed the mass in song in the pre-Conciliar 20th century; but it seems equally clear from those sources that private devotion was still an element of the experience of the Mass, to a greater or lesser degree depending on the individual, time and place.

[Southern Comfort]

Conclusion of the bidding prayers with an 'Ave Maria' gives us continuity with previous practice

I'm sorry. It really doesn't. Previous liturgical praxis did not know of it. The fact that some may have indulged in the practice of private liturgical devotions during Mass is beside the point. What John Ainslie, Peter Jones and I are trying to clarify is that trying to incorporate former devotional manifestations into the Church's official liturgy is not only not in conformity with the liturgy as it stands now but is also not in conformity with liturgical tradition either. That is why Rome has told us on two occasions not to do it.

Perhaps we need to be clearer about the distinction between praxis and practice.

[alan29]

Got to agree, otherwise in Mediterranean lands there would be those advocating a pause at the end of the prayers for everyone to wander around lighting candles in front of their favourite statues as a link with previous habits.

[Peter Jones]

I'm sorry. It really doesn't. Previous liturgical praxis did not know of it.

SC is correct here NT - and we didn't have any Bidding Prayers either ! Tell us more about what your sources are saying because it's a little confusing and we could be talking at cross purposes.

I am beginning to wonder if your sources are bringing to mind the announcement of the NOTICES (remember them folks?) when the priest could go on at some length a piacere (no photocopiers in those days). A priest could have slipped in a Hail Mary for some intention or another - or an Eternal rest… for someone who had died, perhaps.

[NorthernTenor]

Perhaps we need to be clearer about the distinction between praxis and practice.

Praxis, schmaxis. Your observation is telling, SC. The application of the concept of praxis to the liturgy is, I’m afraid, pernicious. It refers to the putting of theory into practice. The, liturgy, though, is essentially a thing received, not something for those who pride themselves as experts to impose their ideas upon. As the Holy Father once wrote, only “respect for the Liturgy’s fundamental unspontaneity and pre-existing identity can give us what we hope for: the feast in which the great reality comes to us that we ourselves do not manufacture, but receive as gift.” [Spirit of the Liturgy, p. 168]

I did not say we must recite the Ave at the end of the bidding prayers because it is a matter of received tradition at that point. As Fr. Peter has pointed out (unfortunately missing my point), the bidding prayers are a modern innovation. I did say that invoking the help of the saints for our intentions is a traditional practice, and so an entirely natural way to conclude the bidding prayers; and that expression of devotion to Our Lady is, in particular, something that Catholics do (as Contrabordun put it so pithily), and within living memory did during Mass.

The comments of some on this thread and elsewhere – and the unreferenced appeals to the opinions of Archbishop Bugnini – support my observation that opposition to this practice is vocal amongst those emotionally and ideologically committed to a break with the liturgical past. That is ironic, because it pits those who put such emphasis on the pastoral utility of liturgical practice against the devotion of the faithful to Our Lady, expressed in a manner that is both consonant with tradition and the more public, collective ethos of the Mass of Paul VI.

[Southern Comfort]

As Fr. Peter has pointed out (unfortunately missing my point), the bidding prayers are a modern innovation.

"Pay attention at the back of the class there"

You clearly haven't been following this thread and its previous incarnation properly.

(a) The Bidding Prayers are not a modern innovation (and that was not what Peter Jones was pointing out); they just weren't part of our practice from the Middle Ages until after Vatican II.

(b) Even when they were, they didn't have the Hail Mary in them.

End of story. Please let us stick to facts.

and that expression of devotion to Our Lady is, in particular, something that Catholics do (as Contrabordun put it so pithily), and within living memory did during Mass.

(c) While it may be something that Catholics do, and indeed did as a private (and silent) devotion in parallel to the Mass within the form of the rosary, the Hail Mary has never been part of the liturgy for Mass of the Roman Rite, a further major reason why Rome does not wish us to attempt to make it so.

I'm not sure why we have to keep going back and forth on these issues, when the facts are extremely clear.

invoking the help of the saints for our intentions is a traditional practice, and so an entirely natural way to conclude the bidding prayers

Yes it is, and I posted an appropriate way of doing that on Wed Mar 28 at 10:18pm.

[nazard]

...
(a) The Bidding Prayers are not a modern innovation (and that was not what Peter Jones was pointing out); they just weren't part of our practice from the Middle Ages until after Vatican II.

ie they were considered such a rotten idea that they were dropped once before.

[Southern Comfort]

...
(a) The Bidding Prayers are not a modern innovation (and that was not what Peter Jones was pointing out); they just weren't part of our practice from the Middle Ages until after Vatican II.

ie they were considered such a rotten idea that they were dropped once before.

Some would say that the same is true of the Responsorial Psalm, which as a form flourished briefly in the 4th-5th centuries and then disappeared. Then, however, the reason was not that it was a bad idea but because the musicians got hold of it. Responses became more and more elaborate, verses reduced in number, and the people were silenced. In reinstating this form in our postconciliar rite, those who worked on the reform were not only trying to take us back to the times of our ancestors but rather more importantly engage the assembly once again in the sung Word of God.

I think the same underlying principle was at work with the Bidding Prayers — to make them once again the Prayer of the Faithful.

[NorthernTenor]

I'm not sure why we have to keep going back and forth on these issues, when the facts are extremely clear.

I’m sorry you find it so difficult to have people disagree with you, SC. Perhaps your work (whatever that might be) has kept you too much in the company of those who don’t. Nonetheless, this is a discussion board, so I will persevere.

I think a key mistake you make is to identify liturgy as the manufactured word and directive of a given age, at the expense of the many other elements of practice and tradition – in this case, patterns of private prayer and contemplation. That is an imbalance with respect to the new form of the Rite, in which these elements have an important place, but it is simply anachronistic to view the older form in such a way. Like it or not – and you clearly don’t – private Marian devotion was an element of the Faithfull’s experience of Mass. The Anglophone use of the Ave at the end of the bidding prayers connects to that tradition in a way that is entirely in keeping with the ethos of the new form. So, too, it fits there because the bidding prayers – which are not prescribed – are prayers of the people, and the Ave is something Catholics naturally say when praying for help for themselves and others. I can only surmise that the evident distress this causes you is a sign of just how strongly the practice connects to a liturgical tradition you abhor, and of your commitment to the hermeneutic of reform but not that of continuity.

I fear this is a fundamental imbalance of approach that underpins much that you assert. It is also evident in your remark that

The Bidding Prayers are not a modern innovation (and that was not what Peter Jones was pointing out); they just weren't part of our practice from the Middle Ages until after Vatican II.

Tradition is received directly from those who came before us. It is developed and transmitted down the centuries, not manufactured by antiquarians who wish to project their own modern preoccupations onto it, and use selected and edited parts of their understanding of early history to justify themselves. Pope Pius XII specifically warned against this error in Mediator Dei, in which he described as “perverse” those who would “go back to the rights and usage of antiquity, discarding the new patterns introduced by disposition of Divine providence to meet the changes of circumstances and situation.” [63-64]

[John Ainslie]

Like it or not – and you clearly don’t – private Marian devotion was an element of the Faithfull’s experience of Mass.

There is a fundamental problem of logic here. What I do privately during an event/occasion doesn't give me the right to homologate it to the event and then say afterwards that it is part of the event. The fact is (and I am old enough to remember it) that some people chose to say their rosary during Mass because they preferred their private devotion to paying attention to what was happening at the altar. I am stating a fact, not passing judgement. It was in part a natural reaction to an execution of the liturgy which was remote from them and in which they had little apparent part. What they were doing, praiseworthy in itself, would have been better done at another time, as successive Popes since Pius X had indicated: see the first paragraph I quoted above from the Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy. The renewal of the liturgy at Vatican 2 was precisely to make the liturgy more accessible to the people so that they would not feel the need to have recourse to their own devotions during the Mass.

Liturgical tradition is not the unthinking continuation of past practices occurring during the liturgy which were at best para-liturgical and in fact a distraction from it. Rather it lives in the continuing renewal and fostering of best practice of the liturgy itself, as directed by the Church's magisterium.

[Southern Comfort]

I’m sorry you find it so difficult to have people disagree with you, SC.

If the cap fits, NT, if the cap fits....

I have absolutely no problem with you or anyone else disagreeing with me. It would be an incredibly boring world if we all thought the same about everything. Where I have a problem is when you adduce facts that are quite simply incorrect in support of your opinions. Given that people can and do learn all kinds of rubbish from internet forums because anyone can post whatever they like, regardless of whether it is true or not, there is a moral obligation — and I think especially on contributors to this forum, which is well respected as a source of accurate information — to ensure that what appears is actually the truth. As long as you persist in posting statements that are in error, I'm going to have to keep correcting you, in order that others are not led astray.

You can post whatever opinions seem good to you, and I may or may not choose to debate with you over them, but in the realm of facts you, like the rest of us, have a duty to keep to the straight and narrow. The fact that you may not always find the facts palatable is beside the point. We all have things that we might prefer to be different, and being mature adults we learn to live with those as well as with the things that we enjoy and agree with.

I think a key mistake you make is to identify liturgy as the manufactured word and directive of a given age, at the expense of the many other elements of practice and tradition – in this case, patterns of private prayer and contemplation.
<snip>
Tradition is received directly from those who came before us. It is developed and transmitted down the centuries, not manufactured by antiquarians who wish to project their own modern preoccupations onto it, and use selected and edited parts of their understanding of early history to justify themselves.

All I can say in response to this unwarranted slur is that you are clearly no scholar. I most certainly do not identify liturgy as the manufactured word and directive of a given age, but as something which has over two thousand years grown and developed and changed, depending on the age and the culture. Nor do I desire to project my own preoccupations onto it, though you clearly do. I am quite comfortable with those who have different viewpoints, and it is always possible to learn from differences of opinion. That is how humanity grows. But opinions need to formed within a context of accurate data, not from what one might wish historical fact to have been. I think accusations of wanting to project one's own opinions onto history are liable to come back and bite those who make them.

[mcb]

a report from a parish in Arundel and Brighton tells me the a letter has gone out from the Bishops' Conference to every parish in the country instructing us to desist from the practice of including the Hail Mary immediately. This letter hasn't made it on to my radar, has it to anyone else's?

I've heard word today (indirectly) from our bishop, asking "that we join the practice of the universal Church by not saying the Hail Mary at the end of the Universal Prayer."

[johnquinn39]

We have discussed here the anomaly of the Hail Mary in the 'bidding prayers' and its history. I do not intend to reopen that debate.

However, a report from a parish in Arundel and Brighton tells me the a letter has gone out from the Bishops' Conference to every parish in the country instructing us to desist from the practice of including the Hail Mary immediately. This letter hasn't made it on to my radar, has it to anyone else's?

Even if such a letter exists, I'm sure no Parish Priest would ever seriously try go get rid of the Hail Mary after the bidding prayers.