Ordinary of the Mass
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The Ordinary of the Mass (Latin: Ordo Missae) is the set of texts of the Roman Catholic Church Latin Rite Mass that are generally invariable. This contrasts with the proper, which are items of the Mass that change with the feast or following the Liturgical Year. The Ordinary is printed in the Roman Missal as a distinct section placed in the middle of the book, between the Mass of the Easter Vigil and that of Easter Sunday in pre-1970 editions, and between the Proper of the Seasons and the Proper of the Saints thereafter.
[edit] Choir parts
The following parts, if not sung by the whole congregation, are traditionally sung by a choir. The texts are invariable except for the Tridentine Mass Agnus Dei.
- 1. Kyrie eleison ("Lord have mercy")
- 2. Gloria in excelsis ("Glory be to God on high")
- 3. Credo ("I believe in one God"), the Nicene Creed
- 4. Sanctus ("Holy, Holy, Holy"), the second part of which, the Benedictus ("Blessed is he"), in the Tridentine Mass, often sung after the consecration, particularly when the setting was long
- 5. Agnus Dei ("Lamb of God")
The Kyrie eleison was traditionally sung in Greek, the others in Latin. But the use of other languages, once a rare privilege only given to the Slavs of Dalmatia (in present day Croatia) who used Old Church Slavonic written in Glagolitic characters, is now more common than the use of Latin and Greek.
The Kyrie, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei are part of every Mass. Until the 1970 revision of the Roman Missal, the Agnus Dei was modified for Requiem Masses, and prayed not miserere nobis (have mercy on us) and dona nobis pacem (grant us peace), but dona eis requiem (grant them rest) and dona eis requiem sempiternam (grant them eternal rest).
The Gloria is reserved for Masses of Sundays, solemnities and feasts, with the exception of Sundays within the penitential season of Lent (to which, before 1970, were added the Ember Days occurring four times a year, and the pre-Lenten season that began with Septuagesima), and the season of Advent (when it is held back as preparation for Christmas). It is omitted at weekday Masses (called Ferias) and memorials, and at requiem and votive Masses, but is generally used also at ritual Masses celebrated on occasions such as the administration of another sacrament, a religious profession or the blessing of a church.
The Credo is used on all Sundays and solemnities. Until simplified by Pope Pius XII in 1956, the rules (some 400 words in Section XI of the Rubricae generales Missalis) were much more complicated, listing, among other Masses, those of Doctors of the Church, those celebrated during octaves and certain votive Masses.
During the Middle Ages it was common in certain uses of the Roman Rite (such as the Sarum Use) to add tropes to the Kyrie. The tropes were essentially texts particular to a specific feast day interpolated between the lines of the Kyrie. The 1970 revision of the Roman Missal has extended the availability of this practice to all Masses (though in a different way.)
It was at one time a popular tolerated abuse to replace at a Solemn Mass the second half of the Sanctus (the Benedictus) with hymns such as the O Salutaris Hostia, or, at requiems, with a musical setting of the final invocation of the Dies Irae: "Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem."
The phrase Ite, missa est "Go, it is the dismissal" (referring to the congregation) is the final part of the Ordinary in the post-Tridentine Mass, but is omitted if another function follows immediately. In the Tridentine Mass, it was followed by a private prayer that the priest said silently for himself, by the final blessing, and by the reading of the Last Gospel (usually John 1:1-14), and in some Masses it was replaced by Benedicamus Domino or Requiescant in pace. These phrases are sung to music given in the Missal, as is the choir's response, Deo gratias or (after Requiescant in pace) Amen. Because of their brevity, the responses have seldom been set to polyphonic music except in early Masses such as the Messe de Nostre Dame by Machaut). The same holds for other short sung responses, such as Et cum spiritu, Gloria tibi, Domine, Habemus ad Dominum, and Dignum et iustum est.
[edit] Music
These texts were traditionally sung to Gregorian chant. Beginning in the Middle Ages, they began to be set to elaborate musical compositions. Some of the best composers wrote Masses. They include:
- In the Middle Ages: Machaut, Hildegard of Bingen, Dunstable, Alfonso X
- In the Early Renaissance: Ockeghem, De la Rue, Dufay, Josquin des Prez
- In the Late Renaissance: Palestrina, Victoria, Byrd, Lassus
- In the Baroque era: Vivaldi, Monteverdi, Charpentier, Zumaya
- In the Classical era: Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Cherubini
- In the Romantic period: Schubert, Gounod, Brahms, Rheinberger
- In the Twentieth Century: Britten, Duruflé, Poulenc, Stravinsky
While some of the later compositions (especially those of the Classical Period and later, which contained many abuses such as 'telescoping' parts or all of the texts of the Gloria or Credo, or employing musical themes from secular music) are seen by many as entertainment rather than aids to religious devotion, music recently composed for the vernacular translations of the same texts is not considered to have yet reached an even remotely corresponding standard of excellence.
[edit] Non-choir parts of the Ordinary of the Mass
Unlike the five main choir parts, some of the other texts of the Ordinary of the Mass were in 1970 partly revised. They can be grouped as follows:
- The Tridentine-Mass Prayers at the Foot of the Altar, or the post-1970 Penitential Rite
- The prayers said in connection with the Scripture readings
- The Offertory prayers
- The Canon of the Mass, or Eucharistic Prayer, with its opening dialogue and its Preface, the latter of which, in spite of being variable, is included in the Ordinary of the Mass
- The Our Father and the following prayers, leading to the priest's communion, to which since 1970 is added the communion of the people, previously not part of the Ordinary of the Mass. (The prescribed rite for the distribution of Communion--which Pope John XXIII shortened slightly by omission of the Confiteor and Absolution--was often printed within or after the Ordinary of the Mass in missals for use by the faithful, but not in the Roman Missal of the time.)
- The prayer said at the cleansing of the chalice, and the concluding prayers, which in the Tridentine Mass included the reading of what was called the Last Gospel (usually, the first fourteen verses of Saint John's Gospel) as a farewell blessing.
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Gregorian chants of the Roman Mass |
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Kyrie | Gloria | Credo | Sanctus | Agnus Dei | Ite missa est or Benedicamus Domino |
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