The Eucharist has been celebrated for over two thousand years, given to us by Jesus himself and preserved by the Church. Our liturgy transcends ties to any particular generation and belongs to all. The Mass as we know it today was handed down to us through a process involving much discernment, dialogue and collaboration. An understanding of this process will help us as we prepare for the transition to the revised English texts.

Let’s start with terminology. This Spirit Spot series will make reference to a number of terms that may be unfamiliar or new to many people.

Roman Missal is the liturgical book that contains the text and ritual for the celebration of the Mass in the Roman rite of the Catholic Church. The word “missal” is derived from “missa,” the Latin word for Mass. The upcoming changes pertain to the common responses and acclamations that the people speak or sing at every Mass (the Glory to God, the Creed, etc.), and the prayers that the priest recites alone from the Sacramentary, the big red book you can see on the altar at every liturgy. The title of the Sacramentary will also change. It will now simply be called the Roman Missal.

There have been three editions of the Roman Missal. The first edition was published by Pope Paul VI in 1969 and featured a liturgy that was approved for complete translation in the vernacular (the language of the people). The corresponding English version was published as the Sacramentary in 1974.

The second edition was published by Pope Paul VI in 1975 and contained some revisions in the rites.

The third edition of the Roman Missal was published by Pope John Paul II in 2002 and contains prayers for new saints and some additional liturgical revisions. The Congregation for Divine Worship thought this third edition was a good opportunity to look again at the English translation and make it more faithful to the original Latin.

The Congregation for Divine Worship is one of several bodies or departments of the Roman Curia, the central governing body of the Catholic Church, with offices at Vatican City in Rome. As the name implies, this congregation is charged with overseeing the liturgical practices of the Church. There are several other congregations that oversee other concerns: Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Congregation for the Clergy, Congregation for Catholic Education, etc.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is an association of bishops representing all the Catholic dioceses in the United States. The conference constitutes the authority of the Catholic Church in America and is charged with many concerns, including charitable works, public policy, and the liturgy. In the past decade, the USCCB has been in dialogue with the Congregation for Divine Worship, working with them to craft the revised English translation of the Roman Missal.

The Council of Trent (1545-1547) was an ecumenical council, i.e., a universal gathering of Roman Catholic bishops to discuss and decide upon important Church matters. Among other things, this council helped unify the diverse liturgical practices prevalent throughout Europe in the 16th century. Partly as a response to the Protestant Reformation, the Council of Trent decreed that the Mass would be celebrated in Latin so Catholics would not confuse it with the vernacular services of the new Protestant communities.

The Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) was the most recent ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, convened by Pope John XXIII to help bring the Church into the modern world. One of this Council’s lasting legacies was the approval of a vernacular liturgy that encouraged the full, active and conscious participation of the people in the Mass.

The next Spirit Spot in this series will focus on the importance of Latin as the language of the Church and how that language colors and influences the way we pray.