THE LOST ART OF REQUIEMS REFOUND

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There were no eulogies. There was no casket, no chatter. No slides 'celebrating the life of ...'. No ghastly overheads, because during the Mass there was no singing. Neither were there any 'Readers'. Or 'Eucharistic Ministers'. There wasn't even a sermon. 

But the Latin Requiem Mass I had the privilege to attend last Thursday at St Mary's, Palmerston North, inspired me to email my five children, in their 'nightly' that evening, to take note: a Latin Requiem is what their awkward, demanding, unreasonable mother wants for her miserable soul.

I didn't altogether overlook the difficulty of finding a priest to celebrate: it's not that easy for a man schooled in the easy-peasy, go-with-the-flow, do-your-own-thing Novus Ordo Missae ('New Mass') to learn how to celebrate the ferial (weekday) Traditional Latin Mass, let alone a Requiem. 

One such brave and faithful priest has denied that it's a case - as I'd suggested to him - of just "saying the black and doing the red" of the rubrics of the Latin Mass Missal. 

So with considerable prescience, just last week I'd told a grandson who not long ago had said "I want to make a difference", that the best way to make a difference is to become a priest. I refrained from overwhelming him with the idea of becoming a priest who celebrates the Mass of the Ages, the Immemorial Mass, but that would be the ideal.

The image above does not portray - sadly - St Mary's Palmerston North, the interior of which is raked, meaning that the church floor slopes down towards the altar, so the congregation looks down on the altar where Our Lord is sacrificed, instead of raising their eyes towards Him. That's a Masonic idea and utterly opposed to the requirements of the Catholic Church. It seems as if parish priests just get hold of an architect for their new church, and the architect and his/her ego just gets on with it, unhindered by any theological or spiritual considerations.

St Mary's Palmerston North - thank God for the tree ...

I say, above, that there were no eulogies. Everything that needed to be said about the deceased had been said the night before at the Rosary, which distance prevented me from attending. 

I'll bet it was a real Rosary, unadulterated and not truncated - not omitting the Credo so as not to offend delicate Proddy sensibilities, because the deceased was a real Catholic, a faithful Catholic dedicated to Our Blessed Mother and to her way of "praying the Gospel".

instead of a 'casket', there was a coffin. The Latin Mass does not employ euphemisms. There were no 'Readers' or so-called 'Eucharistic Ministers' because the priest performed those duties. In the Latin Mass, the priest is the priest. He does not employ deputies. 

Before Mass we sang "Holy God we Praise Thy Name." We were there to worship God and pray for the soul of the deceased, not to 'celebrate his life'. After Mass we sang "Salve Regina" - somewhat more of a challenge but there were enough Latin Massgoers there to carry the day.

Before Mass, Father gave a brief explanation of the Latin Mass and how it differs from the Novus Ordo. 

Most importantly, he explained that Holy Communion would be given on the tongue - to practising Catholics, period. 

No ifs, buts or maybes. No 'blessings' for Proddys and unbelievers, as the former are invited to receive at  Novus Ordo 'funerals', God only knows why, as everyone is blessed anyway, before they depart the church - aren't they?

'Blessings' given in the Communion queue are as fatuous as the 'Good morning, everyone' which follows the 'Peace be with you' at the beginning of most NO celebrations; and more than fatuous they are a sacrilege, if as often happens the priest proceeds after blessing one person in the queue with a hand on the shoulder, or even worse on the head, to give Communion - Our Lord Jesus Christ - with the same hand to the next.

I don't know how it is in other parishes but in mine there are no acolytes, no servers, at Requiems.  At St Mary's last Thursday there were two acolytes, father and son (the latter aged eleven), for the Mass, and a third joined in for the incensing of the coffin. All surpliced, all with hands joined in prayer, all genuflecting whenever passing the tabernacle (regrettably, at St Mary's, sidelined), the eleven year-old reciting by heart all the Latin responses with his father and "doing the red" impeccably. 

Instead of a sermon, Father said a very few, well-chosen words - all that were necessary - after Mass and before the Commendation. And then we sang the "Hail Holy Queen". In Latin. We managed. 

The order of service was for a "Requiem Mass for the repose of the soul of N". What? No 'celebrating the life of'? No. 

It was illustrated by a depiction of the Church Militant attending a Latin Mass with angels around the altar (as they always are present, not just during the Mass); below that, the Church Suffering (souls in Purgatory) and above them the Church Triumphant (the saints in heaven). 

The photo on the back showed the deceased not at his most glamorous stage of life but in an advanced state of his illness, trying to smile, with a crucifix beside him. It was a speaking likeness.

At the after-match I spoke to a Latin Massgoer. I said that Requiem would surely result in recruits for the Latin Mass. He rather floored me by saying, emphatically, "No!" Well, he knows the people  there better than I do. 

But in the hope of proving him wrong, here's something from the invaluable website OnePeterFive. https://onepeterfive.com/the-beauty-of-a-requiem/ 

The writer is describing his first experience of a Latin Requiem:

Having been to my share of modern Catholic funerals, I was absolutely struck by the profundity of the Requiem’s eschatology — not at all like the hagiographic approach taken today — such as that found in the Offertory:

O Lord Jesus Christ, King of glory, deliver the souls of all the faithful departed from the pains of Hell and from the deep pit: deliver them from the mouth of the lion, that Hell may not swallow them up, and they may not fall into darkness; but may the holy standard-bearer Michael introduce them to the holy light: * Which Thou didst promise of old to Abraham and to his posterity.

V. We offer Thee, O Lord a sacrifice of praise and prayers; do Thou receive them in behalf of those souls whom we commemorate this day: grant them, O Lord, to pass from death to life. Which Thou didst promise of old to Abraham and to his posterity.

The Dies Irae alone is worth whatever sacrifices one must make to ensure the benefit of a Requiem on the occasion of their death. A more fitting sendoff — both somber and hopeful — one could not hope to find.