Question about "Praying the Mass"...

20wldct · #1 Jun 13, '12, 9:07 pm

What does it mean to "pray the Mass"?

Can a lay person "pray the Mass" by themselves? I was planning on going to my local Church tomorrow and praying the Mass to myself using my 1962 Missal. Am I "allowed" to do that? Obviously there would be no communion or anything like that, but should I just read along for tomorrow's Mass?

Sorry if that didn't make much sense...

Mike30 · #2 Jun 13, '12, 9:11 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by 20wldct

What does it mean to "pray the Mass"?

Can a lay person "pray the Mass" by themselves? I was planning on going to my local Church tomorrow and praying the Mass to myself using my 1962 Missal. Am I "allowed" to do that? Obviously there would be no communion or anything like that, but should I just read along for tomorrow's Mass?

Sorry if that didn't make much sense...

Praying the Mass merely means that you pray along with the Priest.If you are going to an Extraordinary Form of the Mass, that is one of the correct ways to do things. I'm not sure I would try to use a 62 Missal at an Ordinary Form Mass though. That would lead to problems with participating fully with the Ordinary Form.

At an Extraordinary Form Mass though, it would be fine

20wldct · #3 Jun 13, '12, 9:15 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike30

Praying the Mass merely means that you pray along with the Priest.If you are going to an Extraordinary Form of the Mass, that is one of the correct ways to do things. I'm not sure I would try to use a 62 Missal at an Ordinary Form Mass though. That would lead to problems with participating fully with the Ordinary Form.

At an Extraordinary Form Mass though, it would be fine

Actually I was going after work and there is no Mass. It's basically going to be me by myself in the Church going through the Mass on my own. Is that even allowed? No communion or anything, just reading the words of the Mass and the readings and all that.

Mike30 · #4 Jun 13, '12, 9:21 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by 20wldct

Actually I was going after work and there is no Mass. It's basically going to be me by myself in the Church going through the Mass on my own. Is that even allowed? No communion or anything, just reading the words of the Mass and the readings and all that.

Sure you can do it. Lots of people do it on a daily basis. I do it regularly. I don't go so far as to read the words of the consecration and such, but everything else, sure.

Why would you think that praying isn't allowed. The Mass has been described as the greatest prayer there is.

20wldct · #5 Jun 13, '12, 9:44 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike30

Sure you can do it. Lots of people do it on a daily basis. I do it regularly. I don't go so far as to read the words of the consecration and such, but everything else, sure.

Why would you think that praying isn't allowed. The Mass has been described as the greatest prayer there is.

I wasn't sure since I'm just getting back into "being Catholic". So when you read it you just read everything except the consecration?

YoungTradCath · #6 Jun 13, '12, 10:52 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by 20wldct

I wasn't sure since I'm just getting back into "being Catholic". So when you read it you just read everything except the consecration?

You can read whatever you want in your hand Missal. They all include the words of consecration ("Hoc est enim Corpus meum... Hic est Calix Sanguinis mei..."), and there is no problem with you reading those words. It would be inappropriate for you to say those words aloud during the Mass, just as it would be inappropriate to say any of the priest's parts aloud during the Mass, but yes you can certainly read them, because that is what they are there for. It is quite appropriate for you to be aware of the sacred action, and if it means reading along with a Missal, then do that if you like. Many people do so.

Now, this "praying the Mass" thing. This has become somewhat of a slogan for the use of the sung Propers at Mass. For a while now (like over a hundred years) it has been semi-common to replace the music that the Church prescribes for Mass with random hymns. The Church assigns three "Proper" chants to every Mass: Introit, Offertory and Communion. They are said to be proper to the Mass because every Mass has different chants in these places. They are almost always taken from scripture and set to a melody, and we call the whole collection of chants, Proper and Ordinary (unchanging parts of Mass), Gregorian Chant. Like I said, for a while it has been common to replace the Proper chants with random hymns, and the result is your average parish "four hymn sandwich." Recently, within probably the last ten years or so, there has been a movement to stop replacing the Propers with hymns. One of the popular slogans of this movement is "pray the Mass," with "the" stressed. This refers to the fact that the Propers are actually THE text of the Mass assigned by the Church, while hymns are just random songs that replace them and are not technically "the Mass," so to speak. I'm not sure if this is what you were thinking, but this is how this phrase is most commonly used, I think.

**ProVobis** · #7 Jun 14, '12, 12:39 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mike30

I'm not sure I would try to use a 62 Missal at an Ordinary Form Mass though. That would lead to problems with participating fully with the Ordinary Form.

At an Extraordinary Form Mass though, it would be fine

I've been at OF Masses where there was some reciting of some of the priest's parts of the Mass. "Through Him, with Him,.." was one of those parts. Sometimes this participating thing goes a little too far. Thankfully this practice was stopped by the bishop.

floresco · #8 Jun 14, '12, 3:57 pm

Quote:

Originally Posted by 20wldct

I wasn't sure since I'm just getting back into "being Catholic". So when you read it you just read everything except the consecration?

Traditionally a missa sicca omits the Offertory, Consecration and Communion.