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The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass

Introduction

OVER and over again once sees articles and letters in the papers and periodicals discussing suggestions as to how to hold people to Church attendance, and, especially, to keep them from drifting away from religious influences and associations.  Methods of preaching, of singing, and beautiful ceremonies to make worship attractive and less "cold" are described and urged. 

Naturally these communications do not come from Catholic sources.  There may be, and unhappy there are, many lukewarm Catholics.  Nevertheless not once, nor even twice a day, but five and six and even seven times, where there are crypts and chapels, the Catholic people stream to holy Mass on Sunday mornings.  There is no singing except at High Mass, and then it may be mediocre, the preaching may not be distinguished by eloquence nor attractiveness, the church itself may be simple and devoid of architectural or artistic excellence.  Why do they come?  Because to them "the Mass is the perpetual sacrifice of the New Law, in which Christ our Lord, under the appearances of bread and wine, offers Himself to His heavenly Father, by the hands of the priest, in an unbloody manner, as He once offered Himself on the cross in a bloody manner."  (Gisler)

The body and blood of Jesus Christ present upon the altar in transcendent love draws and holds them.  Take away the Mass and the real presence, and Catholic worship would become as cold as that from which Protestants slip away so easily and Catholic churches would not show a corporal's guard in the way of attendance.

The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the center of our faith and worship, the real presence in the tabernacles the abiding source of grace and strength that keeps the heart even of the lukewarm Catholic, the Mystery of Love which makes of the Church triumphant, the Church suffering, and the Church militant a mystical union in Christ.

What wonder that denying this august sacrifice our separated brethren find worship "cold," and faith disappearing?

The better, then, that the symbols and ceremonies of the Mass, presenting the story of the Redemption as they do, are understood by the Catholic, the more he may hope to feel himself moved to adoration and thanksgiving.  And yet how many attend Mass and have but the most superficial and passing knowledge of the rich meaning of the sacred ceremonies—so little that if they are in a front seat they will hardly know when to rise and when to kneel.  Thus uninstructed, the soul cannot be expected to move with the mysteries of the altar, much less defend itself by giving a reason for its faith—against the attacks which the unbelievers delight to make on the "superstitions" of Catholics.

The identity of the essential ceremonies of the Mass as it is celebrated now with those used by the early Christians, is abundantly proved by historic evidence.  The word "mass" itself is a reminder of the persecution and difficulties of the primitive Church.  It comes from the Latin word, "missa," dismissed.  In early times the unbaptized and penitents, could remain only the first part of the Mass, and were dismissed at the beginning of the sacrifice proper.  The name Mass was given to the whole of the ceremony, however, in order the better to conceal the sacred mystery from all the unbaptized and save it from the ridicule and blasphemy of the heathens.

The Worship of the Early Christians

JUSTIN "the martyr" (100-167) gives a description of the manner of celebrating Christian worship in his time:  "On the prayers being ended the kiss of peace is exchanged.  Then bread, together with a cup containing wine and water, is given to the bishop.  Taking it in his hands, he gives praise and glory to the Father in the name of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, and recites an expressive prayer of thanksgiving for the gifts bestowed on us.  At the conclusion of this prayer the people answer aloud: Amen, i.e., so be it.  Thereupon the ministers, whom we call deacons, distribute the bread, the wine and water, that has been consecrated by the giving of thanks, to all present, and they also carry it to those who are absent.  This food we call the Eucharist; none may partake of it except those who have been baptized for the forgiveness of sins and the inheritance of eternal life, and who live in accordance with the precepts of Jesus Christ.  For we do not receive this as if it were common bread or common drink, but, as Jesus Christ by the word of God was made man, and took human flesh and blood for our salvation, so, we are taught, this food, which by change of substance is the nourishment of our spiritual life, through the command expressed in His words, becomes the body and blood of the God made man.  For the apostles in their writings, which are called the gospels, tell us that Jesus Christ commanded them to do what He did; that, after He had taken the bread and given thanks, He said to them:  Do this for a commemoration of Me: this is My body.  Likewise, after He had taken the chalice and given thanks, He said: This is My blood, and gave it to them all."

            It is curious to observe how the very same prayers which the priest now recites at the altar are to be found in the most ancient liturgies or orders of divine worship.  A prayer taken from the oldest liturgy, that of the apostle James, who for twenty-nine years was Bishop of Jerusalem, is as follows:  "Send upon us and upon these Thy proposed gifts.  Thy most holy Spirit, that, coming upon them with His holy and good and glorious presence, He may hallow and make this bread the holy body of Thy Christ, and this cup the precious blood of Thy Christ."

            At the breaking of bread, while the priest holds the one half of the sacred Host in his right hand and the other in his left, and dips in the chalice that which he holds in his right hand, he says:  "The communion of the most holy body and blood of Our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ.  It hath been united and sanctified and accomplished in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, now and ever."  The celebrant then continues:  "Behold the Lamb of God, the Son of the Father, sacrificed for the life and the salvation of the world."  The thanksgiving runs thus:  "We give Thee thanks, Christ our God, that Thou hast vouchsafed to make us partakers of Thy body and blood for the remission of sins and eternal life."

            Hence it will be seen that the prayers appointed for the celebration of holy Mass in the early Church coincide not merely in their meaning, but in their very wording, with those in use at the present time; thus they afford unquestionable proof of the truth of the Catholic doctrine concerning the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  All sects, moreover, who have separated themselves from the Church, with the exception of Protestants, agree on this point with the Catholic Church.  The Greeks and Russians, the Armenian, Syriac, and Chaldaic Christians all do so.  They all prostrate themselves before their God hidden under the semblance of bread, and adore Him as their Lord.

Charges against the Early Christians

THE early Christians took the greatest care to conceal the doctrine as well as the celebration of the holy mysteries from pagan and even from catechumens.  This was done out of reverence and awe; also as a precaution, to prevent the uninitiated and uninstructed from being present at divine worship, which would have given rise to misconceptions and brought down on them persecution.  They were well aware that the teaching of the cross was unto the Jews a stumbling-block, unto the Gentiles foolishness.  Accordingly it was never mentioned in the presence of Jews or Gentiles, and even the catechumens who were desirous of being baptized, and who were admitted to Christian instructions, were obliged to leave the church after the first part of the Mass was ended, before the Offertory.  The doctrine of the Adorable Sacrament of the Altar and of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was not expounded to them until after their Baptism.  On this subject St. Cyril of Jerusalem says:  "When catechumens are present we do not speak of the holy mysteries in a manner that they can understand; we are often compelled to make use of enigmatical language, which the faithful who are duly instructed will comprehend, but which awakens no suspicions in the mind of the uninstructed."  It certainly would not have been necessary to use these precautions had the matter in question been merely a commemorative feast, at which common bread and wine were partaken.

            In spite of all it was impossible to prevent reports respecting the worship of the Christian becoming prevalent, that which took place being most grossly misrepresented.  Terrible charges were brought against the Christians.  It was alleged that they offered human sacrifices, drank the blood of their victims, killed and ate young children.  The hatred felt for Christians grew to such a pitch that the Emperor Nero thought himself safe in burning Rome and accusing the Christians of the crime.

            The Christians themselves would endure any torture, or death itself, rather than raise the veil of mystery wherewith they shrouded their sacred rites.  It is recorded in the Acts of the Martyrs that St. Blondina when questioned concerning the fabulous crimes attributed to the Christians gave as her only answer:  "I am a Christian, and nothing shameful is done among us."  In regard to the accusation of eating human flesh she said:  "How can it be imagined that we should be guilty of such a crime, who from a spirit of mortification abstain from partaking even of ordinary meat?"  How easily the Christians might have refuted these charges by saying:  That of which we partake is nothing more than a little bread and a little wine.  But this would have been considered an act of treachery, and they therefore held their peace, and allowed anything to happen to them rather than disclose the lofty mysteries of religion to the uninitiated.  This necessity for concealment is the reason why so little is said by the early Christian writers about the holy sacrifice.

The Requisites for the Celebration of Holy Mass

IT is meet that in the most sacred act of worship every detail should be minutely ordained and determined, nothing being left to the discretion or pleasure of the minister.  The commands of the Church are precise and must on no account be overstepped.  In the same manner under the Old Dispensation almighty God Himself gave instructions to Moses as to how everything was to be made; not the Temple itself alone, but also the sacerdotal vestments and the vessels to be used in divine worship.  The third book of Moses contains these divine regulations.  On this account it is called Leviticus, the book of the Levites or ministers.

Ecclesiastical Furniture and Sacred Vessels

THE Holy Sacrifice of the Mass may only be offered upon an altar.  Even the heathen perceived that it was meet to have a special place for sacrifice, and built altars.  We read that after the Deluge Noe built an altar unto the Lord and offered holocausts upon the altar.  (Gen. viii. 20.)  Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob did the same.  (Gen. xii. 7, xxvi. 25, xxxi. 54.)  In the Temple at Jerusalem there were two altars of sacrifice: the altar of burnt-offering in the court, the altar of incense in the sanctuary.

In his epistle to the Hebrews the Apostle Paul speaks expressly of the altar of the New Covenant:  "We [Christians] have an altar whereof they have no power to eat who serve the tabernacle [the Jews]."  (Heb. xiii. 10.)  The first altars of the early Christians were nothing more than simple wooden tables.  In the church of St. John Lateran, where the head of St. Peter is preserved, the small wooden table upon which the prince of the apostles offered the holy sacrifice in the catacombs of Rome is enclosed within the high altar.  In this same church may also be seen the table of cedar-wood on which Our Lord instituted the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar.  In order to escape from their pagan persecutors the early Christians were compelled frequently to change the place where the holy sacrifice was offered, so that it was only when the Church enjoyed peace that permanent altars were erected.  Ecclesiastical rules were then drawn up to regulate the construction of the altar, as well as concerning the celebration of divine worship in general.

The altar-table must consist of a single slab of stone with a smooth surface.  In the center and at the four corners a cross, the four arms of which are of equal length, must be carved on it.  Relics are placed in the altar as a memorial of the custom in the first ages of the Church of raising the altars over the tombs of martyrs.  If there are several altars in one church the one which stands in the choir is called the high altar, the others are called side altars.  It is of ancient usage in the Latin Church to have several altars in the house of God.  In the catacombs of Rome there are chapels excavated in the walls, containing two, three, or even more altars.  The high altar is raised upon steps to indicate that to the Triune God all glory and all sacrifice belong.  The altar is consecrated by the bishop with special ceremonies; this consecration does not always take place in the church; more often a slab of stone is consecrated, in which relics are placed and sealed up, and which is anointed with chrism with the appointed prayers.  This stone is afterwards let into the altar exactly in the center, where the chalice stands and the Host is laid at the time of Mass.  These altar-stones are sometimes enclosed in small tables, which can be folded up and are called portable altars.  Missioners make use of them when traveling on foreign missions, and army chaplains in the camp; they are also employed when an immense concourse of people renders it necessary to erect an altar in the open air. 

A crucifix is to be set upon the altar, large enough to be visible from a distance, in order to remind the faithful that the same Victim is sacrifices here in a bloodless manner which was immolated to the Lord upon the cross with shedding of blood.  On each side of the crucifix there must be at least one wax candle, both of which are lighted at Mass.  For High Mass there must be at least four in use, and during exposition of the Blessed Sacrament at least six lighten candles, for which reason six candlesticks stand, as a rule, on the high altar.  The candles must be of pure beeswax, because wax is the purest combustible produced by nature; their white color is significant of innocence.  The light they shed is symbolical of the presence of Him who speaks of Himself as "the light of the world."

The altar must be covered with three linen cloths, one above another, to guard against desecration of the precious blood, should the celebrant have the misfortune to let any drops fall.

Three cards stand upon the altar: one, the largest, in the middle; the others, one on the left, the other on the right side.  The Church requires the priest to utter every word distinctly and according to prescribed rules, on account of which he always has the Missal before him and reads the prayers from it.  On the altar-cards are inscribed certain prayers which he can not read from the Missal without inconvenience.  On the one in the center are the Gloria, the Creeds, the offertory prayers, the prayer before the elements are blessed, and Our Lord's words of institution, printed in large characters.  The card on the epistle side contains the prayer when the water is blessed and the 25^th Psalm, which is recited by the priest while he washes his fingers.  The card on the gospel side contains the beginning of St. John's gospel, which is, as a rule, read at the conclusion of holy Mass.  All this shows us how careful and conscientious the priest has to be in clearly articulating every word of the Mass.

Upon the high altar stands the tabernacle, which is so called because it is the antitype of the Jewish tabernacle, the dwelling-place of God among men.  "Behold the tabernacle of God with men, and He will dwell with them.  And they shall be His people: and God Himself with them shall be their God." (Apoc. xxi. 3.)  The tabernacle is the most sacred spot upon earth.  It is the place where Christ miraculously dwells.  It is the seat of uncreated wisdom, the glorious ark of the New Testament, the tower of strength, the abode of Him who is the pledge of salvation and of life eternal, the tent God pitches among men, the new heaven upon earth, whereat the angels gaze in amazement.

Seeing this to be so, the greatest care ought to be expended upon the tabernacle, both as to the interior and the exterior.  The exterior should be of artistic workmanship.  One often sees it adorned with a design of corn and grapes, in gold or silver, to remind us of the appearances beneath which Our Lord is hidden.  On each side of the tabernacle are often figures of angels adoring, above it a pelican feeding her young with her own blood, while upon the door the paschal lamb is frequently represented.  The interior ought to be draped with white silk or cloth of gold, a white linen corporal being spread out below.  The key of the tabernacle ought to be gilt.  In cathedrals the tabernacle is generally not upon the high altar, but on a side altar, because the bishop is frequently obliged to sit while performing Episcopal functions at the high altar.

Before the tabernacle the perpetual light must be kept burning.  This lamp, which must be fed with a vegetable oil, is to show that on the altar before which it hangs the Light of the world is Himself present. 

The principal vessels used in the holy sacrifice are the chalice and the paten.  The chalice is the cup for the sacrificial wine which is to be changed into the blood of Christ.  The Jews made use of the chalice in their sacrifices, for David says:  "I will take the chalice of salvation, and I will call upon the name of the Lord."  (Ps. cxv. 4.)  And of Our Lord it is said explicitly that having taken the chalice He said:  "This is the chalice," etc. (Luke xxii. 20.)  The rubric requires that no other vessel be used but a chalice and that it should be made, if possible, of one of the precious metals.  Pious Catholics have presented at all times to the Church valuable chalices of gold richly chased and adorned with jewels.  Even in the poorest churches the chalices must be of metal and have a silver-gilt lining.  The paten, also, a round plate upon which the consecrated Host is laid, must be of metal and gilt.  The chalice may be regarded as an emblem of the sepulcher of Our Lord, and the paten as the stone placed at the entrance of the sepulcher.  Both chalice and paten must be consecrated by the bishop with chrism according to the form prescribed in the Pontifical; a priest has not the power to consecrate them.

The corporal, which accompanies the chalice, is a square linen cloth whereon the chalice stands and the Host rests.  It is marked with a small cross on the upper surface, because the sacred Host must always be laid on the same spot.  The corporal represents the winding-sheet wherein Christ's body was wrapped by Joseph of Arimathea.  When not in use the corporal is kept in the burse, a case covered with the same material and of the same color as the chasuble.  During Mass the chalice is covered with the pall, a small square of linen stiffened with cardboard, lest anything should fall into it.  From the commencement of Mass until the offertory, and again after the communion, the chalice is covered with the veil, which also resembles the chasuble in color and material.  For cleansing of the chalice and wiping the priest's hands after the communion, the purificator, a small linen cloth, is used.  In some places the priest, when taking a few drops of water from the cruet to pour into the chalice, makes use of a small spoon which is kept in the chalice at other times.

Although the ciborium and the monstrance cannot be classed among the sacred vessels required for the celebration of holy Mass, we shall still speak of them here.  The ciborium, or pyx, serves for the reservation of the sacred Hosts which are required for communion, especially for the communion of the sick.  This vessel must be of metal, the cup at least, and gilt inside.  The Blessed Sacrament is in some places exposed to the veneration of the faithful in the ciborium during public prayers or the minor services of the Church, such as the Saturday devotions, etc.

On the occasion of solemn expositions, or when the Blessed Sacrament is carried in procession, the sacred Host is placed in a kind of shrine made for the purpose, and called a monstrance, because in it the Adorable Sacrament is shown to the people for their veneration.  This is done, for instance, on the feast of Corpus Christi and during the exposition of the Forty Hours. 

The Ecclesiastical Vestments

THE priests of the Old testament, when officiating in their sacred functions, wore splendid vestments, of which the material, the shape, the color, the ornamentation, were minutely prescribed by God Himself.  The priests of the early Church had not, perhaps, very gorgeous vestments, but they had special festive garments for their sacerdotal functions, because what has once been used in divine worship cannot be put to the ordinary uses of everyday life.  At an early date the Church not only appointed the vestments that were to be worn, but attached to each a mystic meaning.  This could not be otherwise when the great dignity of the priest is considered, and the solemnity and sanctity of the act he is empowered to perform.  The several vestments which the priest puts on for the celebration of holy Mass, and which must all be duly consecrated, are these:

The amice, or humeral, a linen cloth laid upon the shoulders in order to cover the neck.  In ancient times the head of the criminal condemned to death was enveloped in linen and the amice recalls the humiliation which, the tradition says, was put upon Christ in the house of Pilate.

The alb, a tunic of white linen reaching from head to foot, such as was worn by the priests of the Old Law. (Ezech. Xxviii. 4.)  This denotes the innocence and purity that ought to distinguish the priest who ascends to the altar; it also recalls the seamless coat for which the soldiers cast lots at the foot of the cross.  It is held in round the waist by the girdle, which represents the cords wherewith Our Lord was bound.

The maniple, originally, was a narrow strip of linen suspended from the left arm, which supplied the place of and was used as a handkerchief.  About the eighth century it was placed among the sacerdotal vestments.  It is to remind the wearer that he must not shrink from arduous labors in the service of God.  The maniple is now of the same material and color as the chasuble.

The biretta is a three- or sometimes four-cornered headgear.  According to common opinion, it came into use when the practice of wearing the amice on the head was discontinued.  Its signification is akin to that of the amice.

The stole was originally the uppermost garment.  It was white, embellished at the edge with a border of some other color.  It is now only a narrow band, placed around the neck and crossed over the breast.  Deacons wear it over the left shoulder.  Subdeacons may wear the maniple, but not the stole.  The stole is the distinctive mark of official authority, on which account a priest must not, except when saying Mass, wear it in the presence of the bishop without express permission.  It signifies the robe of original innocence which man lost at the fall.  The priest must wear a stole when performing any ecclesiastical function, such as baptizing, marrying, hearing confessions, etc.

The chasuble, the distinctive vestment for Mass, was originally a round cloak, with an opening through which the head was passed, the front part resting on the arms, so as to give the hands free play.  As it covered the whole body, this vestment was called casual or chasuble (a hut).  The shape being very inconvenient, the server was obliged, whenever the priest genuflected, to hold it up, whence comes the custom of raising the chasuble at the time of the consecration, although it is now of a more manageable form.  The chasuble is intended to signify the sweet yoke of Christ (Matt. xi. 30), which the priest is bound to take upon him and to follow his Master.  For this reason there is often a cross upon the back of the chasuble.

When the deacon and subdeacon attend upon the priest at Mass they are vested in the dalmatic in place of the chasuble; it is a festive garment formerly worn by persons of superior station, and brought from Dalmatia, whence the name dalmatic is derived.

If any other priest besides the deacon and subdeacon is in attendance upon the celebrant he wears neither chasuble nor dalmatic, but a cope.  This vestment is also worn by the priest in other solemn functions, such a solemn Vespers or processions of the Blessed Sacrament.

When a bishop celebrates Mass he wears several things distinctive of his office.  He has sandals of the same color as his vestments, for he is the preacher of the Gospel, and to him are applied the words of the Apostle:  "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, of them that bring glad tidings of good things" (Rom. x. 15).  He wears a ring, because he is espoused to the Church, of which he is one of the guardians; he wears gloves to denote the force of his blessing.  As a pastor of Christ's flock he carries a crozier, while the miter, the head dress of a prelate, marks his supremacy over all the clergy who are subject to him.  The pectoral cross worn by the bishop on his breast signifies the love of Jesus Christ and His yearning for the death on the cross.

Ecclesiastical Colors 

FROM the time when vestments as distinct from ordinary garments, were appointed to be used in divine worship certain colors were also fixed for them, varying with the day or season, as an outward sign of the sentiments that ought to inspire the worshiper.  The Church makes use of five colors:  white, red, purple, green, and black.

White is the color of innocence and of joy.  It is used on the feast of the Holy Trinity, on festivals of Our Lord, of the Blessed Mother of God, of the angels, and of all saints who are not martyrs.  Likewise at the consecration of a church, the ordination of priests, the consecration of bishops, and similar festivals.

Red is the color of fire and of blood.  It is the Holy Ghost who kindles the fire of divine love in the hearts of men; accordingly red is used at Pentecost, on the feasts of the Finding and Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the feast of the Five Wounds, etc.  It is also used on the feasts of the holy apostles, with the exception of St. John, and of the holy martyrs, who shed their blood for the faith of Christ.  Originally white and red were the only colors used in the Church, and that is why the Pope still wears only white and red.

Purple, or violet, is symbolical of humility and penance.  It is used in Advent and in Lent, on Ember days, with the exception of the Ember days at Whitsuntide, which fall within the octave of Pentecost, when red is used, on vigils, for penitential processions, and on all occasions when a penitential spirit is required—for instance, in the administration of Extreme Unction and the Sacrament of Penance.  

Green betokens hope—the hope of eternal life, which Christ the Lord has once more brought within our reach.  It is used on all Sundays and weekdays from the octave of the Epiphany to Septuagesima, and from the third Sunday after Pentecost until Advent, unless the Mass is of some feast.

Black is the sign of mourning, and is used in Masses for the dead, on Good Friday, and All Souls' Day.

Not infrequently black vestments are embroidered with white.  This is to signify that the holy souls in purgatory, for whom we pray, are in a state of grace, and are certain to be admitted to the joys of heaven when their period of expiation is at an end.

Ceremonies of the Mass

"THE order of the Mass," says Pope Innocent III, in his treatise on the sacrifice, "is arranged upon a plan so well conceived that everything done by Jesus Christ, or concerning Him, from His Incarnation to His Ascension, is there largely contained, either in words or in actions, wonderfully presented."

            The Mass is divided into three parts, corresponding to the three epochs in the life of Our Savior.  The first, from the Introit to the Credo, comprises the thirty-three years of the life of Our Lord up to the institution of the Eucharist.  The second, from the Credo to the Pater, retraces the different scenes of His sufferings.  The third, from the Pater to the end of the last gospel, embraces all His glorious life.

FIRST PART

THE PREPARATION AT THE FOOT OF THE ALTAR

            IN the earthly paradise the first man enjoyed familiar conversations with God.  He fell, and was driven far from the face of the Lord, and sentenced to live in a vale of tears.  He was not, however, left without hope; a Redeemer was promised to him and to his children.  And for four thousand years all the echoes of this poor earth carried up to heaven cries of anguish and of confidence, claiming the fulfillment of the divine promise.  The Church places before our eyes at the beginning of the sacrifice the reminder of this fall.  The priest, as he descends the steps of the altar, represents man fallen, and driven from paradise.  The preparatory prayers which he then recites recall those of the world of antiquity.

            "I will go unto the altar of God, to God who rejoiceth my youth.

            "Judge me, O God, and distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy.

            "To Thee, O God, my God, I will give praise upon the harp: why art thou sad, O my soul; and why dost thou disquiet me?"

            A Redeemer has been promised to the guilty world; toward this divine victim all eyes are turned.  The cross, foreseen by the prophets, will be the hope, at the same time that it is the support and consolation, of humanity.  The priest indicates this thought to us as he traces the sacred sign several times upon his brow during the preparatory prayers.

THE INTROIT, OR THE INCARNATION

THE prayers ended, the priest ascends the steps of the altar, and, resting his hands upon the sacred table, kisses it respectfully.  This ceremony, so simple in appearance, is filled with mystery.  It represents the infinite love of the Son of God in His Incarnation.  God pursued humanity, which, since the time of Adam, had tried to escape from the yoke of obedience and love.  There was a day, a day fixed from all eternity in the decrees of God, for which He waited:  apprehendit, thus St. Paul expresses it.  What would He do to this guilty, fleeing humanity?  He embraced it in the clasp of an infinite charity; He clothed Himself with the mantle of its miseries: the Word was made flesh.

            The anthem of the Introit, by the chant, and not by the meaning of its words, is the expression of the ardent longing which made "the clouds rain the just" (Is. xlv. 8); so says Innocent III.  "It is repeated to show the ardor of these sighs" (De Sacro Alt. Myst., 1. ii. c. 28); and in solemn Masses its chant, grave and slow, reminds us how long it was before heaven granted the Messiahs, only after forty centuries of tears and waiting.  Why is this anthem preceded by the sign of the cross?  Why show already the sign of the humiliations and agony of Calvary?

            Theology answers us.  From the first instant of His Incarnation Jesus Christ saw the rods, the thorns, the blows, the nails, the lance, the cross, and He suffered in His heart all the torments of His sorrowful Passion.  "Even in sleeping," says Bellarmine, "the heart of Jesus saw the coming cross."  Christian art has transformed this teaching into an allegory as beautiful as it is touching.  The child Jesus sleeps upon a cross, and His little hands press to His heart a crown of thorns.

            From whom has the mystery of the Word made flesh received its first adoration?  When God revealed it to the heavenly spirits, they chanted its praise before the throne of the Eternal; then one of their prices, the archangel Gabriel, in the humble house of Nazareth, had first the privilege of adoring with Mary the Word Incarnate.  For this reason the Gloria Patri, the chant of the angels, divides the Introit.  

            Before the Introit in solemn Masses the altar is incensed.  Ecclesiastical tradition has seen in incense the symbol of the sweet odor of Jesus Christ.  To the name of Jesus has been added another, that of Christ, meaning anointed or sacred, for He has received from His Father a mysterious unction, of which the world has caught the blessed perfume.   

THE KYRIE, OR THE CRY OF FALLEN HUMANITY

            THE Kyrie is the cry of humanity at all the periods of its history, but above all at the coming of the Messiah.  St. Paul said:  "For we know that every creature groaneth, and travaileth in pain even till now" (Rom. viii. 22).  Said before the Gloria, it expresses the profound misery of the old world, and the immense need that it had of redemption.  In this place, too, the Kyrie has another signification:  "The seventy weeks are short ended," said the angel to Daniel (Dan. Ix. 24), and the doctors believe that the time of the Incarnation was hastened in the designs of God as a recompense to the prayer of the patriarchs, the prophets, and of Mary above all. 

            Nine times the Church repeats this cry, in memory of the nine heavenly choirs.  While the rebel angels tried to prevent the accomplishment of the divine plan, the good angels implored God for the Incarnation with all their strength.  They united their prayers to those of earth.

THE GLORIA IN EXCELSIS, OR THE CHANT OF BETHLEHEM

TO represent the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem the priest returns to the middle of the altar, while the last Kyrie carries to God the supplication of earth.

            Borrowing from the angels the words sung beside the cradle of the infant God, he announces to the world the supreme joy:  "Gloria in excelsis Deo, et in terra pax hominibus bona voluntatis."

            In solemn Masses the choir continues the celestial chant, for the Gospel says that an angel proclaimed the good news to the shepherds:  "And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God" (Luke ii. 13).  The hands of the priest raised toward heaven at the word gloria seem to try to return to God all the glory.  "Not to us, O Lord, but to Thy name be the glory," sings the Psalmist (Ps. cxiii. 9).  To God be the glory of all our works; to us the humility, but also the peace which is their assured fruit.  It is in order to receive this divine peace that the priest again joins his hands at the words:  Pax in terra.

            Persecution quickly attacked the child in the crib, but He escaped the fury of Herod by flight.  The sign of the cross at the end of the joyous canticle of Bethlehem should recall to us the massacre of the innocents, the flight into Egypt, the anxieties of exile, and also the blood shed under the knife of the circumcision.

THE DOMINUS VOBISCUM, OR THE EFFUSION OF

THE SEVEN GIFTS OF THE HOLY GHOST

            "IT is necessary to remark," says the venerable Olier, "that the priest does not say, Dominus vobiscum, or Oremus, without first kissing the altar, and even before the Orate fraters he kisses it again, to show that it is from the bosom of God that he draws the spirit of prayer which he wishes to give to the people.  It is the same case in the benedictions which he gives the people, or to the host, or to himself; they are often preceded by a kiss upon the altar, to show that he gets from God the blessings for the people and himself, having of himself neither graces nor blessings, except in God, who has, as St. Paul says, 'blessed us with all benediction in His Son.'"

            What touching reminders are in the salutation Dominus vobiscum, The Lord be with you!  The greatest joy of Christianity is to know that God remains with His children in the sacrament of His love.  The open and widespread arms of the priest give Him to us all; his arms closed tell us why He gives Himself: "that we may be made perfect in one" (John xvii. 23).  Seven times the priest salutes the faithful by the Dominus vobiscum; seven times is the same response heard: "Et cum spiritu tuo"—at the collect, the Gospel, the Offertory, the Preface, the Agnus Dei, the Post-communion, and the Ite, Missa est.  Seven is the number of the Holy Spirit, called septiform in the chants of the Church; the faithful beg for His seven divine gifts at each salutation of the priest:  First, after the Gloria, for the gift of wisdom, which the incarnate Wisdom has merited for us, triumphing over pride in the humiliations of the stable.  Second, before the Gospel, for the gift of understanding, to comprehend, the word of God.  Third, at the Offertory, for the gift of counsel, which makes us prefer the joys of sacrifice to the pleasures of the world, after the example of the Savior, immolating Himself for us at the Last Supper.  Fourth, at the Preface, for the gift of fortitude, which sustained Our Lord in the anguish of His agony in the Garden of Olives.  Fifth, at the Agnus Dei, for the gift of knowledge, the divine light which enlighteneth each soul admitted to the banquet of angels.  Sixth, at the Post-communion, for the gift of piety, so necessary for him who has become the living tabernacle of Jesus Christ.  Seventh, at the Ite, Missa est, for the gift of the fear of the Lord, which should inspire us with a holy fear at the thought of the Last Judgment.  Five times only does the priest turn toward people in addressing them with the salutation of peace.  The Church has so arranged it, to figure in this sacrifice commemorative of the Death, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ, the five apparitions of Our Savior on Easter Day.  The Gospel mentions Magdalene, the holy woman, St. Peter, the disciples at Emmaus, and the apostles as having enjoyed this favor. 

THE COLLECT, OR THE PRAYERS OF THE HIDDEN LIFE

            BEFORE the storm of persecution raised by Herod, Our Lord fled into Egypt.  The severe trials of exile in an idolatrous land were succeeded by hard tasks in the workshop until He was thirty years old.  During the days passed in Egypt and in Nazareth, the divine Savior silently wrought the work of our Redemption by labor and prayer.  When the priest leaves the middle of the altar to go to the epistle side, we think of Jesus as a child, journeying into exile.  His hands raised to heaven reminds us of the manual labors of Nazareth, and the Collect of the prayers which sanctified it.

            The hands raised during the Collect, the Secret, and the Post-communion have another mysterious meaning.  Tertullian tells us that in his time it was customary for Christians to pray with the arms extended in the form of a cross; later the hands only were raised; but the profound meaning of this ceremony remains the same.  Jesus Christ alone has the right to be heard.  If man, then, wishes to obtain grace from on high, he must identify himself with his Redeemer, become another self by sacrifice, resignation, and the cross.  The priest himself has become a man of trials and sorrow because he has made himself our mediator in prayer; this is why God has constituted the priesthood a Calvary, and not a Thabor.  "Let us pray," the priest says, pray together; let us put ourselves in those dispositions which obtain everything from God.  His raised hands when he says these words remind us what these dispositions are: to accept, the cross without murmuring, the carry it resignedly.

            Often the priest joins his hands.  Of this position Nicholas I. wrote to the Bulgarians:

            "It is very suitable during prayer," says the Pope, "to bind one's hands so to speak, before God, and to conduct ourselves in His presence like criminals prepared for punishment, in order to escape condemnation, such as the wicked receive in the parable of the Gospel."

THE EPISTLE, OR THE MISSION OF THE PRECURSOR

            BEFORE the Gospel, and under the name of Epistle, the Church reads certain extracts from the Old or New Testament.  This reading recalls to us the mission confided to the prophets and disciples of preparing the world for Our Lord's preaching the Gospel.  It was for this end that the divine Master sent before Him some of His chosen ones before He came to preach.  Among those thus sent there is one greater than all the others; he came like the dawn, proclaiming the rising of the Sun of justice, and it is he whom the Church has especially in view in the ceremonies which accompany the reading of the Epistle.  Thus, contrary to the manner reading the Gospel, the Epistle is read or sung, with the face turned toward the east, because St. John the Baptist always had his eyes fixed upon the Messiah, whom the Scriptures and the Church style "the true Orient."  In solemn Masses, the chant of the Epistle is an echo of the voice of the precursor "crying in the wilderness," and the absence of lights around the subdeacon is an illustration of those words applied to John:  "He was not the light" (John i. 8).  The faithful remains seated during the chanting of the Epistle, to figure the sad state of the old world—"of them that sit in darkness and the shadow of death" (Luke i. 79)—before Jesus Christ came to bring them truth and life.

THE GRADUAL AND TRACT, OR THE SIGNS OF PENITENCE

THE Gradual and the Tract, always analogous to the truths contained in the Epistle, are the response of the faithful, the protestation of their good will and their disposition to conform to the precepts which they have just heard.  The crowd assembled by the preaching of St. John the Baptist returned to their homes converted and penitent; it is of this page in the Gospel story that we should think during this part of the Mass.  The commentators on the liturgy have observed that the chant of the Gradual presents greater difficulties in its execution than the other liturgical chants.  Why has the Church thus arranged it if not to show her children that the observance of the Lord's law is hard to fallen nature, and that one cannot "love the good God even a little," as St. Vincent de Paul has so well said, "except by the sweat of his brow."

THE ALLELUIA, OR THE CANTICLE OF THE CELESTIAL COUNTRY

            IF the labors of the service of God affright our soul, at least the sight of the reward arouses our courage.  "They who sow in tears shall reap in joy" (Ps. cxxi. 6).  The Alleluia, the joyous chant of heaven, following the Gradual and Tract, arouses in our hearts this consoling thought.  "We shall rejoice more than we can express," says St. Gregory the Great.

            "We prolong indefinitely the heavenly song, that the ecstatic soul may fly toward those blessed regions where life shall have no end, the light no cloud, and happiness be unmixed with sorrow."  This unending bliss is a happiness which even the tongue of St. Paul himself could not describe, and the Church, by this long series of inarticulate tones which accompany the Alleluia, has but one thought—to show to her children that words fail her when she thinks of the splendors prepared for the elect of God.  This is the interpretation of St. Bonaventure.

            The notes and words added to the Alleluia were called sequences, that is to say, the prolongation of the Alleluia; they are also called the Prose.   

THE GOSPEL, OR THE PREACHING OF JESUS CHRIST

            THE time to begin His mission had come; Our Lord left Judea to go into Galilee.  His choice was Capharnaum, a city wherein lived many Gentiles.  Previously to beginning His public life He prepared Himself for preaching the Gospel by forty days of penance and prayer in the desert.  How does the Church recall to us these circumstances?  The priest withdraws from the epistle side of the altar, as Our Lord left ungrateful Judea; then, pausing in the middle of the altar, still like his divine Master, he recollects himself, and prays.

            Changing the place of the book before the Gospel, shows us, says St. Bonaventure, that "the nations, figured by the left side of the altar, have received the doctrine of Jesus Christ from the Jews.  For the Jews, with the exception of a small number, have rejected the teaching of the Savior, and driven out the apostles.  And they have deserved to hear the words:  'Because you have refused the word of God, we will carry it to the Gentiles.'" (Expositio Missae.)

            The same book brought back to the right side toward the end of Mass prophesies the return and pardon of the children of Israel.  (Rational, 1. iv. c. 27).  There shall come a day when Our Lord will reunite the dispersed tribes, to receive them into the fold of the Church; then they will accept the truth rejected by their fathers.

            The preaching of the Gospel is the invincible weapon which God has always used to conquer the demon; it is this which the Church desires to teach in ordering that the priest shall turn toward the north in reading the Gospel.  Why the north?  On that side the rebel angel has established his throne, says Isaiah.  (xiv. 13).  And Jeremiah adds:  "From the north shall an evil break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land" (i. 14).  The only thing that can stem the venom which Satan pours forth upon the world is the word of God.

            Having been seated during the Epistle, the faithful rise at the Gospel, to show that the old world, shaking off the dust of the tomb, was raised to life by the word of Jesus Christ.  This is also to recall the other miracles wrought by the voice of Our Savior: the sick healed and rising up and walking; the dead brought back to life and falling at His feet; the crowd leaving all to follow Him.

            The sign of the cross made by the priest on the sacred text reminds us that Jesus Christ has confirmed the truth of His teaching by His death; the cross has been the seal of the Gospel.  The priest then makes the sign of the cross upon his brow, his lips, and his heart.  "This triple sign of the cross," says Father Lebrun, "prints the memory of Jesus Christ and His holy words in our mind, that we may be filled with the holy lessons which Jesus Christ came upon earth to teach; and in our hearts, that we may give all our love to carrying them out; and on our lips, that we may love to speak of them, and make them known."

            The priest then kisses the gospel and by this respectful and filial kiss we ask God to pardon all offences and irreverences committed against His divine Word. 

            In solemn Masses the chanting of the Gospel is accompanied with other ceremonies.  The deacon, before fulfilling his duty, asks the celebrant's blessing; no one can preach who is not sent by God, or those who hold his place.  The subdeacon goes with him, to show the harmony between the two Testaments, the prophets and the apostles.

            The Church gives to the Gospel the same honors as to the Eucharist.  She fills its way with the perfume of incense; she accompanies it with the light of tapers; she incenses it three times, and the deacon who carries the Gospel, as well as the priest who bears the Eucharist, receives this testimony of respect.  When we read or hear the sacred Word, we are like children of the household seated around the Lord's table, where we eat the heavenly bread.  "Let us not lose a word of it," Origen warns us, "For, as in receiving the Eucharist we are careful, and rightly so, not to let the smallest crumb fall, why should we not believe it a crime to neglect even a single word of Jesus Christ, as it is to be careless of His body?"  (Hom. xiii. In Exod).

            The priest is also a gospel, but a living gospel; by his conduct he preaches to the people.  That he may not forget this duty so important, the Church bestows upon him the honor of incense, as to the sacred book itself.

THE CREDO, OR PROFESSION OF FAITH IN

THE DOCTRINE PREACHED BY JESUS CHRIST

THE word of the humble workman of Nazareth has transformed the world; it has abolished slavery, exalted poverty, consoled sorrow, consecrated sacrifice.  As it is impossible to attack Jesus Christ, glorious and immortal, the devil has combated His doctrine, and, after the murderers of the praetorium and Calvary had taken from Him His mortal life, Satan inspired heretics whose constant aim was to destroy the spiritual life of Jesus Christ, His life in souls by faith.  But Jesus Christ dies but once; heresies are always vanquished, and upon their tomb the Catholic Church chants her joyous and triumphal Credo.  Let us say it in these pious sentiments; let us also thank God for the inestimable gift of faith.  Let us be ready to defend this faith against all who deny it, even unto death, if need be, for we have solemnly promised to do this in making the sign of the cross at the end of the Creed. 

            By the genuflection at the words:  "And the word was made flesh," we honor the humiliations of the Word Incarnate.

SECOND PART

THE OFFERTORY, OR THE LAST SUPPER

LIKE his divine Master, the priest takes bread in his hands and offers it to God.  Our Lord also offered wine mixed with water.  The wine represents Jesus Christ, "the true vine," and the water, the Christian people.  St. Cyprian, in a letter to Cecilius, teaches this formally.  This image is a vivid figure of the ineffable union of God with man wrought by the Incarnation, and of that other union in the Eucharist, and again of that third union which will be consummated in glory.  It is, then, the Church united with Jesus Christ, the members to their head, the bride to her bridegroom, which the priest offers to God in the oblation of the chalice. 

            Our Lord, before giving His body and blood to the apostles, washed their feet, thus showing us what purity He required in those who would sit down at the sacred banquet.  Equally privileged with the disciples, the priest is about to partake of the same mysteries; it would be a closer imitation of Our Lord if he washed his feet, but, as St. Thomas says, "it is sufficient to wash the hands; besides, it is more convenient, and it is enough to show perfect purity, especially as it is to our hands that all works are ascribed."

            The paschal supper over, the Savior said a hymn as an act of thanksgiving, and, the hymn being finished, went out to the Garden of Olives.  The priest also ends the Offertory with a hymn:  Lavado inter innocents manus meas, and returns to the middle of the altar, in remembrance of the way of Our Lord from the chamber of the Last Supper to Gethsemane. 

THE INCENSING, OR THE PERFUMING BY MAGDALENE

            THREE times, by pouring out her perfumes, the penitent of Bethany wished to honor the person of the adorable Savior: first in the house of Simon the Pharisee, again in the house of Simon the leper, and at the holy sepulcher.  Faithful to fulfill the words of Jesus Christ:  "Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, that also which she hath done shall be told in memory of her," the priest three times incenses the bread and wine of the sacrifice, destined so soon to become the divine body and blood; then he incenses the altar, the figure of Jesus Christ.

            The incensing of the sacred species is done three times in the form of a cross, to recall the Passion of Our Savior, foreshadowed by Magdalene.  "This woman," Jesus Christ said to His disciples, "in pouring this ointment upon My body has done it for My burial."  (Matt. xxvi. 13).  Following this, the incense is offered three times in the form of a crown, because, in His sacred humanity, the humiliations of Jesus Christ were followed by His triumphant coronation.  During this ceremony we think of the mercy of Jesus toward sinners.  Were we a thousand times more guilty than Magdalene, He would receive us tenderly and sweetly.

THE SECRET, OR THE PRAYER IN THE GARDEN OF OLIVES

            OUR Lord, being come into the Garden of Olives, began to pray, but His sorrow soon became so profound that He fell with His face prostrate upon the ground in agony.  And see the priest, come to the middle of the altar, pray also, but leaning forward, his hands joined, in a position of humiliation and prostration.

            A little later Jesus Christ came to seek His apostles, but found them heavily sleeping.  "What," He said to them, "could you not watch with Me one hour?  Watch ye and pray" (Matt. xxvi. 40, 41).  The priest also raises himself, interrupts his prayer, and, turning to the faithful, says:  Orate, fraters.  "It is Our Lord, in the Garden of Olives, exhorting His disciples to pray, that they may not fall into temptation," says St. Bonaventure.

THE PREFACE, OR THE CHANT OF TRIUMPH

            WE have entered into the way of the cross.  Already the clamor of the multitude reaches us, the threatening of the tempest.  Only a few hours now, and the Son of God will be "bound, scourged, buffeted, put to death, and reckoned among the guilty."

            The Church opposes the chant of love to the deicidal shouts, for the Preface is the reparation for the blasphemies hurled against the divinity of Jesus Christ in the hour of His Passion.  It is for us He suffered, and drained the chalice of anguish; the Church in our name thanks God for the blessed sign of the Redemption, and for all the mercies of which it has been the source.  The Preface, the chant of triumph, is also a canticle of thanksgiving.  But when we would praise and thank God we can but stammer like infants, and this is why the Church calls upon the angels, the thrones and dominations, and all the heavenly powers to come with their celestial harps, and chant the Sanctus of eternity.  The priest says it with them, and, like them, prostrated.

            After the hymn of heaven comes that of earth, the chant of the Hebrew children at the triumphal entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem.  This last canticle is accompanied by the sign of the cross: the joys of triumph were of short duration; a few days afterward the same people loudly clamored for the death of this same Jesus when they had received as a king, chanting hosannas.  Our piety will find reminders of an unparalleled ingratitude in the sign of the cross mingling with the Hosanna and Benedictus.

THE CANON, OR THE PASSION

THE sacred chants are followed by the profoundest silence—silence in the priest; silence among the faithful.  Are not the latter the figure of the timid apostles at the hour of the passion?  None among them dared raise his voice in favor of their divine Master, although all had sworn with Peter:  "Though I should die with Thee, I would not deny Thee."

            The divine Lamb in the hands of His enemies uttered not a word, not a complaint.  In the house of Herod, when He was buffeted, He was silent; in the praetorium, under the rods and the thorns, He was silent; on Calvary, confronted with blasphemies, He was silent.  His silence, more eloquent than all words, teaches the pardon of injuries, sweetness in the face of persecution.

            During the three hours of His agony upon the cross Our Lord prayed in silence; His dying lips uttered but seven words, treasured by the evangelists as the testament of His heart.  His representative at the altar prays in a low voice from the Offertory to the Communion, that is to say, during the sacrifice properly so called, interrupting this mysterious silence but seven times, namely:  First, at the Orate fratres; Second, at the Preface; Third, at the Nobis quoque peccatoribus; Fourth, at the Pater Noster; Fifth, at the Pax Domini; Sixth, at the Agnus Dei; Seventh, at the Domine non sum dignus.

            From the Sanctus to the Elevation our minds, and our hearts above all, should accompany Our Lord on the road to Calvary with Mary and the holy women.  With confidence we draw near to Him with Veronica, and beg Him to remember us upon His cross.  Let us recommend to His mercy also at this moment the persons who are dear to us.     

THE IMPOSITION OF HANDS, OR THE CRUCIFIXION

THE priest's hands held over the bread and the wine which are about to be changed into the body and blood of Christ, the sign of the cross so soften repeated, represent vividly the scene of the crucifixion.  History tells us that formerly it was the custom to impose hands upon the head of one condemned to death, to pour upon him all the odium of the crimes of which he was guilty, but this ceremony renewed at our altar reminds us that the innocent One took upon Himself the guilt of sinners, and that it is in the name of sin-stained humanity that the priest lays upon the august victim the sins of all the people, that they may be expiated in His blood.  This is done, too, in the name of God the Father, who, says Isaiah, "hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all."

THE ELEVATION, OR OUR LORD RAISED UPON THE CROSS

"REMEMBER," says Father Nouet, "the elevation of Jesus Christ upon the cross each time that you adore Him during the elevation of the Host; see Him as if He bowed His head to give you the kiss of peace; as if He opened His arms to embrace you; as if His hands were pierced to give you the bounty of His gifts; as if His feet were nailed in order to stay with you."

            The priest, taking the chalice, places it at the feet of Jesus, as if to catch the blood bursting in torrents from all His wounds, and after the consecration he adores it, and the faithful prostrate adore with him.  The olive-trees of Gethsemane, the rods of the scourging, the thorns in the crown, the wood of the cross, the lance of the soldier, were all reddened with this blood enclosed in the chalice raised above our heads.  This blessed chalice also holds the sweat which bathed the workshop of Nazareth, the roads of Judea, the mountain of Calvary.  It contains the tears shed in the crib, at the tomb of Lazareus, gazing at Jerusalem, and over each one of us.  Let us adore it with love and faith. 

            An ancient custom was to sound the trumpet at the moment of the execution of one who had been condemned to death, to drown the cries or words of the sufferer, the tears or murmurs of the crowd.

            Tradition says that this custom was followed at the crucifixion of the Savior; we remember this when the sound of the sanctuary bell floats through the arches.

            Calvary, the cross, the Redeemer, what memories are vividly present to us during the Canon?

            Everything at the altar is of a nature to recall them to us.

            The priest often bends the knee before Jesus Christ, in reparation for the hypocritical adoration rendered by the Jews on Calvary.  Each time that he pronounces the name of the body or blood of the Savior he makes the sign of the cross upon the Host and the chalice, to confess that he has before him the body and blood of Jesus crucified, and he makes it five times, in memory of the five wounds of the adorable Victim, while the kiss he gives the altar is the figure of the reconciliation between heaven and earth wrought by the Redemption.

            From the Elevation to the Pater there are five prayers in the Canon.  In order to say them well let us place ourselves in each one of the wounds of Our Lord.  If our piety leads us to unite ourselves at this time with those privileged witnesses of Our Savior's death, let us recite the first one with Mary, the Mother of sorrows, standing at the foot of the cross; the second with the beloved apostle; during the third let us shed tears of penitence with Magdalene on the feet of Jesus; at the fourth let us unite ourselves with the holy women; and at the fifth, with the good thief let us beg for mercy.

THE MEMENTO OF THE DEAD, OR THE JUST RAISED AGAIN BY JESUS CHRIST

OUR Lord upon the cross remembered the just who had died in His grace:  "And the graves were opened and many bodies of the saints that had slept arose" (Matt. xxvi. 52).

            This same God, the sovereign master of life and death, is upon the altar.  The priest recommends to Him the souls of those "who have preceded us, and sleep in the sleep of peace."  He implores Him to drop upon them the blessed dew of His blood, and to give them "a place of refreshment, light, and peace."

            At the Memento let us all pray for those whom we have lost; faith shows them to us in purgatory, with their guardian angels descending into its abyss, bringing to them the precious blood.

            How consoling to the heart is the thought that many of these pour souls so dear to us receive help in their sufferings.  Some of them, we will gladly believe, entirely purified, come around the altar to join with us, the angels, and the saints in adoring their Redeemer. 

THE NOBIS QUOQUE PECCATORIBUS, OR THE PRAYER OF THE GOOD THIEF

AT these words of the Canon:  "Nobis quoque peccatoribus," the priest raises his voice, and strikes his breast, representing the repentance, the confession, and the prayer of the thief crucified on the right hand of Our Lord.  He openly acknowledged himself guilty:  "We receive the due reward of our deeds."  Then, recommending himself to the Savior, he added:  "Lord, remember me when Thou shalt come into Thy kingdom" (Luke xxii. 42).  Encouraged by this example, the priest dares to ask a place in heaven with the apostles, the martyrs, the virgins, and all the saints.

THE SECOND ELEVATION, OR THE DEATH OF OUR SAVIOR

THE three signs of the cross made with the Host raised above the chalice, and the two others outside of the chalice recall the three hours passed on the cross by the Savior (St. Thomas) and the separation of His soul and His body.  The body is here represented by the Host: the soul by the blood enclosed in the chalice.  (St. Thom.)  The sound of the bell is a symbol of the convulsion of nature in this supreme hour (Benedict XIV.); and the louder voice of the priest, interrupting the long silence of the Canon, recalls the words of the sacred text:  "Jesus uttered a loud cry, and bowing His head He gave up the ghost." (St. Matthew and St. John.)

THIRD PART

THE PATER NOSTER, OR THE PRAYER OF JESUS CHRIST UPON THE CROSS

AT the sight of the bitter chalice presented to the lips of the Savior, He said:  "Father, not My will but Thine be done" (Luke xxii. 22).  And from the cross He called down only benedictions upon His murderers:  "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" (Luke xxiii. 34).

            Formerly the people said the Pater Noster together.  This custom still prevails among the Greeks, and existed in France until the time of Charlemagne.  A trace of this practice is found in the faithful having the honor of saying aloud the last request of this prayer.

THE LIBERA NOS, OR THE MYSTERIES OF THE BURIAL

            "THE chalice," says St. Bernard, "represents to us the sepulcher, and the pall the stone which sealed its mouth; the corporal is the figure of the winding-sheet, and the Host, which we see, is no longer bread, but is the flesh of Jesus Christ fastened to the cross for the salvation of mankind.

            The priest, taking the body of his Savior, laying it in the chalice, which he then covers with the pall, carries us to the holy sepulcher.  The silence which follows the Pater is an image of the silence of the tomb.  It also recalls the recollection and the sorrow of the holy women kept in their homes by the observance of the Sabbath. (Innocent III., l, v. c. 28.)  While the friends of Our Savior on earth were rendering to His body the last duties of love, where was His divine soul?  The souls of the just of the Old Law were in Limbo, sighing as they awaited His coming.  His soul went down to them to announce the nearness of their hour of deliverance.  The prayer Libera nos is the lively expression of their sighs.

THE BREAKING OF THE HOST, OR THE SIDE OF JESUS OPENED BY THE LANCE

            OUR Lord had died, and a soldier armed with a lance opened His right side, from which flowed water and blood.  At that moment, springing from the open side of the new Adam, sleeping on the tree of the cross, came the spouse whom He had chosen, the holy Catholic Church.

            This solemn circumstance of the formation of the Church upon Calvary should have its place in the sacrifice of the Mass.  We shall find it under a thrilling form.  The priest holds above the chalice the body of his God.  He divides the holy species, and then, from the right side of the Host, he breaks a fragment, marvelously figuring the wound in the side of Our Lord.  The Host is divided into three parts, by their number and their nature symbolizing the Church coming from the open side of Jesus Christ.  For Jesus Christ is not divided except in appearance, and under each of the three parts He remains entire.

            This is a symbolic image of the Catholic Church, divided into three branches:  the Church triumphant, the Church militant, and the Church suffering, all three making, however, only one and the same Church.  (St. Thomas.)

            After breaking the Host the priest makes, three times, the sign of the cross with the body of Jesus Christ on the chalice, in memory of the three days in the sepulcher (St. Thomas); then, the priest, like another Joseph of Arimathea, as an early writer calls him, lays it in the chalice become another tomb on this new Calvary.

THE AGNUS DEI, OR THE RESURRECTION

            "IN the Mass," says Benedict XIV., "the Passion and death of Jesus Christ are represented by the separation of His body and His blood.  Although this separation can only be in a mystical manner, because the body could not be apart from the blood, nor the blood from the body, however, by this entirely mystical separation of the body from the blood, and the blood from the body, the Passion and death of Our Lord are perfectly represented.  It remains, then, but to express in the sacrifice His glorious Resurrection; it could not be done more perfectly than by putting into the chalice a fragment of the Host, and thus showing the reunion of the body and blood of Jesus Christ."

            The words of the liturgy now join themselves in the ceremonies to reiterate the holy joys of the Resurrection.  The Pax vobiscum is an echo of the salutation of peace given by Our Lord on Easter to the assembled disciples.  Pax vobiscum, "Peace be unto you," He said to them. (Micrologue, c. xx.)

            On that day the walls of the chamber of the paschal supper heard the solemn words which gave to the apostles the power to remit sin; in memory of this the Church repeats three times the suppliant cry of the Agnus Dei, asking mercy and pardon for her numerous family. (Innocent III., l. iv. c. 4.)  Scarcely has the Agnus Dei, which is called the chant of the Resurrection, been heard in the sanctuary, than the choir, until that time upon its knees, in a posture of humiliation and sorrow, rises up, in token of the victory over death of Jesus Christ arisen.

            During the first six centuries the salutation of the priest:  "May the peace of the Lord be always with you," was the signal for the Christians giving one another peace by embracing.

            The men gave to men this holy kiss, women gave it to women, and then the people, a family of brothers, drew near joyously to the banquet of the Lamb, at which, according to the language of the doctors, the peaceful alone had the right to sit down.  The Church has preserved something of this custom.  In the solemn Masses the deacon gives to the subdeacon the kiss of peace which he has just received from the celebrant; the latter, to show us that he has drawn this peace from the very heart of the Savior, first kisses the altar.  Formerly he kissed the sacred Host.

            This ceremony must have had its origin in the chamber of the Last Supper.  The Gospel does not say so, but Jesus Christ has taught us too much of the compassionate tenderness of His heart for us to doubt that He reassured His terror-stricken apostles by embracing them.

THE COMMUNION, OR THE EUCHARISTIC REPASTS OF JESUS CHRIST, ARISEN WITH HIS APOSTLES

            AFTER the intermingling of the body and blood the priest, with the eyes of faith, sees before him upon the altar Jesus Christ, but Jesus Christ arisen.  He knows Him; it is the same Jesus Christ who, after His resurrection, appeared to the holy women; like them, he bows down to adore Him.  He speaks to Him with a sweet confidence, for Our Lord has said to him, to him also, "It is I: fear not" (John vi. 20).  It is the same Jesus Christ who gave Himself in food to the disciples at Emmaus; like them, the priest knows Him in the broken bread, laid there before him upon the paten.  It is the same Jesus Christ who said to St. Thomas:  "Bring hither thy hand and put it into My side" (John xx. 28).  Recognizing with the apostle his "Lord and God," the priest strikes his breast three times, and humbly says: "Domine, non sum dignus," etc. (Lord, I am not worthy etc.)

            He raises to his lips the Bread of the angels, lays it on his trembling tongue, thus become the throne of the Most High—the union is consummated, and it is no more the priest who lives, but Jesus Christ who lives in him.  The sign of the cross made with the chalice, as it was made before with the sacred Host, recalls to the priest that he is about to drink the blood of his crucified God.

            The disciples at Emmaus had part in the breaking of bread, and, in the repast beside the sea, Jesus Christ, having taken a piece of the broiled fish and of the honeycomb, gave the rest to His disciples.  So, too, the faithful have part of the communion of the priest, either by actually receiving the body of Our Lord themselves, or in a letter degree, by spiritual communion.

THE CHANTS OF THE COMMUNION,
OR THE JOY OF THE APOSTLES IN THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST

            IN the beautiful days of the youthful Church, psalms were sung during the Communion in accord with that holy action.  In the East it was the canticle:  "As the heart panteth after the fountains of waters, so my soul panteth after Thee, O God."  In the West it was the thirty-third psalm:  "I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall be always in my mouth."  The hymns sung now during the communion are the revival of this pious custom.  The ancient psalm of the Communion has been reduced to a versicle called the Communion.  Like the chant of the first centuries, this versicle represents the joy of the apostles at the tidings of the Resurrection. (Innocent III., l. iv. c. 8.)

THE POST-COMMUNION, OR THE FORTY DAYS OF THE GLORIOUS LIFE

AFTER the Communion the priest turns to the people twice to wish them peace: our thoughts should turn to Our Lord repeating twice within the walls of the chamber of the Last Supper the Pax vobis of pardon, and in these salutations the priest, extending his hands and showing his heart, recalls to us principally Jesus Christ showing the wounds of His hands and that of His side to His disciples (Innocent III., l. iv. c. 8.)

During the days of the glorious life Our Lord continued by prayer His office of divine mediator, and in heaven His wounds intercede for us.  The hands of the priest, raised toward heaven during the Post-communion, represents this mystery of mercy.

This prayer is said for the communicants.  During Lent the spirit of humility and of penitence withdrawing from the holy table some of the faithful, the Church, in order not to deprive them of such an efficacious prayer in this part of the sacrifice, established for their benefit a special prayer.  This is the one said last in Lent, and preceded by the words:  Humiliate capita vestra Deo, "Bow down your heads to God."  On Sunday this is omitted, because on this day all the faithful communicating, or being about to communicate, have a part in the prayers of the Post-communion

THE ITE, MISSA EST, OR THE ASCENSION

            THE details of the Ascension, as told in the Scriptures, are: the benediction given to the disciples, the words of the angel bidding them to back to Jerusalem, and the joyous return of these same disciples—three circumstances reproduced in the liturgy at the end of the Mass.

            The priest going back to the middle of the altar represents Our Lord going to Bethany upon the Mount of Olives.  Like his divine Master, he blesses the faithful, and for the last time wishes them peace.  Our Savior said to His followers in order to console them:  "Behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world."

            In Low Masses the priest, or if it is a High Mass the deacon, filling the office of the angels, dismisses the faithful with these words: "Ite, Missa est," that is, "go, the Mass is ended," and "Jesus Christ has left this altar to enter into His glory."  "Deo gratias," Thanks be to God," answer the people, uniting their gratitude to the disciples', who "went back to Jerusalem with great joy, praising and blessing God."

            During Advent and Lent our fathers not only assisted at Mass, but at the Canonical hours with which it was followed.  In those days of longer and more fervent prayers, instead of dismissing the congregation with the words: "Ite, Missa est," they were invited to bless the Lord by the sacrifice of praise: "Benedicamus Domino," "Let us bless the Lord."  These words have been preserved in the Church to remind us that it is necessary to sanctify the holy time of penitence by prayer. 

THE BENEDICTION, OR THE DESCENT OF THE HOLY GHOST

THE prayer of the apostles assembled in that upper room, and that of Our Savior asking His Father to send the Consoler, are figured by the prayer Placeat, placed between the last Dominus vobiscum, the meaning of which we have already seen, and the benediction, regarded by the greatest liturgists as the symbol of the descent of the Holy Ghost on the apostles (Innocent III., vi. 14).  Seven times during the Mass the prayer "Et cum spiritu tuo" rises from the hearts of the faithful to Our Lord, imploring the coming of the divine Paraclete.  These devout aspirations are about to be answered.

The priest first kisses the altar, the figure of Jesus Christ, to show that it is the Son of God who sent the Holy Spirit of consolation upon the earth.  Then he blesses:  "In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost," for, says Innocent III., although the Holy Spirit especially was sent, the works of the Trinity being indivisible, the three divine Persons have cooperated in this mystery: it is for this reason, he adds, that the benediction is given in the name of the august Trinity (Innocent III., vi. 14).  The sign of the cross which accompanies this blessing recalls to Christians that the mercies of Pentecost are the fruits of the merits of the Passion.  Jesus Christ has said this:  "It is expedient to you that I go, for if I go not the Paraclete will not come to you" (John xvi. 7). 

THE LAST GOSPEL, OR THE PREACHING OF
THE APOSTLES AND THEIR SUCCESSORS

            After Pentecost, the apostles, filled with the Holy Spirit, went into all parts of the known world to sow the seed of the Gospel.  Other laborers have carried on the divine work, and even to the end of time the Christian apostolate will be continued upon the earth.  This preaching is figured by the reading of the Last Gospel.  The authority of the apostles was that of their Master:  "He who hears ye hears Me," Our Lord said to them; upon the lips of God or upon those of an apostolic laborer the Gospel is the same; for which reason the two gospels are read at the same side of the altar.

            Because of this, too, they are always accompanied by the same salutation, the same signs of the cross.  However, as the greatest honor is due to the preaching of the Master, for the first gospel only, which symbolizes this, there is chanting, lights carried, the sacred text is incensed and kissed.

            For a long time the Mass ended at the blessing of the priest.  Pope Pius V obliged all priests to add to it the Gospel of St. John.  In some churches it was recited in going to the sacristy; in others it was said within the sacristy.  The usage of the Roman Church is to read it at the altar.  This observation leads us to another.  The preparatory prayers of the Mass, now said at the foot of the altar, were also said for a long time in the sacristy; consequently the Mass upon which the liturgists commented commenced at the Introit, and ended at the benediction.

            Before leaving the altar, the priests who follow the Maronite rite say this beautiful prayer when kissing the altar at the end of the Mass:  "Rest in peace, holy and divine altar of the Lord.  Shall I return to thy feet, or will death prevent me?  I know not.  May God grant at least that I see thee again in the celestial church of the first-born of heaven.  I will rest in this hope which God has given me.  Remain in peace, holy and propitious altar.  May the sacred body, may the blood which has just been offered, wash away my stains, destroy my sins, and give me confidence before the throne of Our God, the immortal Lord.  Remain in peace, holy altar, life-giving table.  Pour down upon me the mercy of Jesus Christ, and may I keep thy memory in my heart, now and forever and ever.  Amen."

Mass for the Dead

            CERTAIN prayers are omitted in the Mass for the dead.  The psalm Judica me, because of these words:  "Judge me, O Lord," and the others:  "Why art thou sad, O my soul?"  The soul for which we pray 몬 already been judged at the secret tribunal of God, and why should we ask the cause of its sadness when perhaps it is exiled from Him whom it loves?

            The Gloria Patri, the Gloria in excelsis, the Alleluia, and the Ite, Missa est, are not heard in the Masses for the dead, because the souls in purgatory are not yet allowed to join in the canticles of the angels. 

            Instead of making it upon himself at the Introit the priest makes the sign of the cross with his hand turned toward the Missal.  The souls who have been recommended to him are in the mind and heart of the priest, s, as soon as he goes up to the altar he applies to them the blessed fruits of the cross, despoiling himself generously in their favor.

            At the end of the Gospel the book does not receive the usual kiss, the show that the souls of the dead have not yet received the ineffable kiss of God, or, again, because having died in the sign of faith there is no need for them to profess their belief in the Gospel.  This same reason is the cause of the omission of the Creed from Masses for the dead.

            At the Offertory, the priest does not bless the water poured into the chalice.  Water, a symbol of Christians in the sacrifice of our altars, represents in Masses for dead more especially the souls in purgatory, and the Church in not blessing the water wishes to show that she has no jurisdiction over these souls.

            The beginning of the Mass was marked by an act of charity on the part of the priest, in not making upon himself the sign of the cross at the Introit.  The end of the Mass shows us the same spirit of charity on the part of the faithful.  There is no benediction; the priest, in the name of the faithful, says, "Miserere nobis," "Have mercy upon us," and at the Agnus Dei, "Dona eis requiem," "Give them rest."

            The Mass ended, absolution is given.  An acolyte carries to the head of the coffin a cross, the pledge of our immortal hopes.  At the absolution, during the Lord's Prayer, the holy water and the incense are poured forth upon the coffin as a symbol of the effects of prayer for the dead.  "May our prayer," the Church seems to say, "rise as the perfume of incense even to Thy throne, O Lord, and appease Thy just wrath.  May it call down upon this poor soul the blessed dew of Thy mercy."

Special Ceremonies of the Pontifical Mass

            THE bishop is the perfect image of Jesus Christ seated at the right hand of His Father; this is why he has a throne, why also he has a place of honor.  The various members of the sacerdotal hierarchy surround him, hastening to clothe him in his ornaments, rendering him profound homage, after the example of the celestial hierarchies forming a glorious crown around the throne of Jesus Christ, and happy to serve Him.

            There is another reminder of heaven in the seven altar-tapers, for the altar upon which the sacrifice of eternity is offered appeared to St. John adorned with seven candlesticks.

            If anything is given to the bishop, or if he receives something, the minister kisses his hand.  This act has been considered from all ages as being an expression of devotion and submission.  "Bless God," the Church seems to say to us, "in prosperity and in adversity; His paternal hand is always worthy of love, whether it showers blessings upon us, or whether it takes them away.

            This ceremony is the literal translation of the beautiful words of Job in affliction:  "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord" (Job i. 21).   And those others of persecuted David:  "I will bless the Lord at all times" (Ps. xxxiii. 1).

            The entrance into the choir represents the coming into the world of Our Lord by His Incarnation.  The cross is borne in advance of the clergy; it has been the beacon of humanity; the world of antiquity saluted it from the beginning with its most earnest vows, its most lively hopes.  The incense is here the symbol of the prayers which made the heavens rain the just upon the earth, and the lights recall the prophecies in the midst of the ancient world, the twilight of a divine dawn.  The subdeacon and the deacon are the Old and New Testaments, the figure and the reality.  The closed book which the subdeacon carries represents the obscurity of the prophecies of the Old Testament.  The assistant priest figures the Law of Moses under the high priest Aaron; he walks after the subdeacon, for these are the prophecies which led the priesthood of Aaron to the knowledge of the Missiah.  The two deacons at the side of the prelate represent Abraham and David, who received the most definite promises of the Incarnation of the Word.  Besides which the Gospel puts them at the head of Christ's ancestors:  "The book of the generations of Jesus Christ, so of David, son of Abraham" (Innocent III. l. ii. c. 6).

            The priest, not being surrounded by ministers as is the bishop, took his maniple before beginning the Mass.  The bishop receives his from the hands of the subdeacon at the moment when he mounts to the altar.

            As soon as the bishop goes to the altar the Missal, closed until then, breaking its seals, opens before him; the bishop kisses it, and then incenses the altar, while the Introit chants the glories of the redeeming Lamb.  The best commentary on this ceremony is the page of the Apocalypse to which it alludes:

            "And I saw in the right hand of Him who sat on the throne a book written within and without, sealed with seven seals.  And I saw a strong angel, proclaiming with a loud voice: Who is worthy to loose the seals thereof?  And no man was able, neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under the earth, to open the book, nor to look on it.  And I wept much, because no man was found worthy to open the book, nor to see it.&n