heresy from Paulines at Christmas
When I went to Baguio City for Christmas eve Holy Mass celebrated by the bishop, I did not expect to hear heresy spouted from a lector/commentator before Mass when I wished to pray in peace.
“Sambuhay: A Pastoral Service of Pauline Priests and Brothers,” is a four-page, pulp-paper, weekly missalette published by the Society of Saint Paul’s Philippine-Macau Province. In the Christmas edition is the following:
“Introduction (Read before the start of the Mass) … Tonight we are witnesses to an event that no one ever dared to imagine. The almighty and powerful God divests himself of his divinity and makes himself small.”
.I didn’t know that God divested himself of his divinity. Did you?
.
.Why, when the General Instruction of the Roman Missal advises silence before Holy Mass, would a commentator read that heresy aloud to a congregation of worshipers?
Why do Paulines of the Philippine-Macau Province communicate falsehood to the faithful?
The Paulines’ “Sambuhay” web page reads:
“Aside from the Sacramentary Prayers and Lectionary Readings for the Sunday Mass, each weekly 4-page issue contains: a one-page front article on the Gospel; short introductions for the Mass proper, for each of the Mass readings …”
The web page tells that “Sambuhay” is “aimed to help Pastors and Ministers of the Word in their weekly preparations for the Sunday Eucharist, and the Church faithful in their active participation in the Sunday Mass.”
That sounds okay; the lectors and celebrants can read before Mass the scriptures and Pauline commentary (“articles”) about each one. But I don’t want a commentator to read aloud a heretical “Introduction” to Holy Mass nor to read the italicized introductions to the First Reading and Second Reading, which are there only for the lectors’ and worshipers’ edification – preparation for worship.
The missalette’s page one article, “The Donkey in the Stable,” is followed by, “Please read the reflection before or after the Mass.” So I’m glad that no one read that aloud before Holy Mass tonight. In the pew behind me, a woman read aloud (quietly) the First Reading and the Gospel. I can’t imagine why. She didn’t read aloud from the “Sambuhay” missalette when her husband took it to the ambo to proclaim the Second Reading…
Incidentally, commentators in Catholic Churches here are fond of telling us to sit, stand and kneel, such as “We all sit for de homily,” though the homilists doesn’t sit, and “We all kneel,” though the priest celebrants don’t kneel.
Red ink rubrics in the Sacramentary are not to be read aloud. Oh, but the commentators don’t read from the Sacramentary …
Have you communicated to the Pauline fathers and brothers? To me, that is amazing what they wrote. Where do you go to mass?