Engaging Beauty

What makes the Ordinariate Mass, called Divine Worship, so beautiful? Where does one begin?

The following points are in no particular order.

1. Beautiful poetry found in hymns and prayers.
2. Respect for liturgical norms that form us in the way of authentic prayer, and respect for Sacred Tradition.
3. Ad orientem worship, God-oriented worship according to ancient practice which preserves orthodox belief.
4. Sacred polyphony, especially motets and settings of the Ordinary (unchanging) chants: Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus/Benedictus, Agnus Dei.
5. Preservation of the (minor) Proper chants: Introit, Gradual, Alleluia Verse, Offertory and Communion.
6. Beautiful vestments that envelop the imagination with beauty pointing to the sacred.
7. Orthodox preaching that invites souls into communion with the Word, Jesus Christ, the Way and the Truth and the Life.
8. Profound respect for the Holy Eucharist.
9. Reverence for the Word of God, the Holy Bible.
10. Fellowship after Mass; holy conversation; the spiritual practice of hospitality.

The Anglican Patrimony, which is "a treasure to be shared" with the entire Church (Anglicanorum Coetibus §5:III), informs the Ordinariate Missal, properly called Divine Worship: the Missal (DW). That Patrimony, which is not limited to "thees" and "thous", seemingly formal yet in reality intimate pronouns by which we address God, is a rich spiritual culture preserved in a corner of Anglicanism that is now returned to the Catholic Church.

Early English translations of the Bible used the familiar singular form of the second person, which mirrors common usage trends in other languages. The familiar and singular form is used when speaking to God in French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Ukrainian, Russian, Yiddish, Turkish, Lithuanian, and Scottish Gaelic (all of which maintain the use of an "informal" singular form of the second person in modern speech). In addition, the translators of the King James Version of the Bible attempted to maintain the distinction found in Biblical Hebrew and Aramaic and Koine Greek between singular and plural second person pronouns and verb forms, so they used thou, thee, thy, and thine for singular, and ye, you, your, and yours for plural. 

Not all that is Anglicanism can be considered to be an authentic spiritual heritage compatible with the Catholic Faith received from Christ through the orthodox successors of the Apostles. What was incompatible has been disregarded, and that which is compatible has been retained.

The Mass of the Ordinariate is the latest version of the Latin Rite Mass celebrated among the people of the Personal Ordinariate established by Pope Benedict XVI. The Ordinariate Mass exists alongside the most well known of the forms, the Ordinary Form, sometimes referred to as the Novus Ordo (New Order) Mass or the Mass of Pope Saint Paul VI, and the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, also referred to as the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM) or Usus Antiquior (Ancient Use).

The Ordinariate Mass draws on the ancient Sarum Use Liturgy "established by Saint Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury, and Richard Poore in the 11th century (that) was originally the local form used in the Cathedral and Diocese of Salisbury, England (Wikipedia)." The Sarum Use was an elaborate variant of the ancient Mass and predates the modestly reformed Mass of the Council of Trent by no less than four centuries. The Ordinariate Mass (DW) is also informed by the English Missal, a translation of the Roman Missal used by Anglo-catholics, and the Missal of St. Paul VI, also called the Novus Ordo Missae. Divine Worship is celebrated in a dignified manner very much like the Traditional Latin Mass of Pope St. John XXIII, commonly called the Tridentine Mass.

The Ordinariate Mass is a balanced synthesis of liturgical texts and practices that represents an authentic realization of the Second Vatican Council's call for a renewed Mass, a liturgy in complete continuity with the received liturgical heritage of the Church. The group responsible for weaving together the Ordinariate Liturgy was/is the Anglicanae Traditiones Interdicasterial Commission (ATIC).

The texts and practices one finds woven together and enacted in Divine Worship: the Missal are those faithfully preserved by Anglicans typically belonging to the Anglo-catholic wing of the Anglican Communion, those Anglicans who retained much of the liturgical and doctrinal authenticity, i.e., the Catholic Faith, that has faded from liberal Anglican thought and practice. Blessed (soon to be Saint?) John Henry Newman, a member of the Oxford Movement, a reform movement in Anglicanism seeking renewal of Catholic thought and practice in the Anglican Communion and unity with the Catholic Church, represents a stellar example of those Anglicans (Anglo-catholics) who took the next or obvious step, having immersed themselves in history, toward unity with the Church by converting to the Church that Jesus founded.

It must be said, and cannot be avoided, that the Ordinariate Mass reconciles the past with the legitimate call for renewal issued by the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council. The Ordinariate Missal achieves what the Missal of Pope St. Paul VI has misplaced and what the Missal of Pope St. John XXIII has need of in terms of prudent updating. That the Concilium charged with overseeing liturgical reform, headed by the controversial Archbishop Bugnini, overstepped its authority is now widely acknowledged as fact. By contrast, the members of ATIC conducted themselves with complete fidelity to Apostolic Tradition and the expression of said Tradition in and through the Anglican Patrimony brought back into harmony with the Catholic Church.

"Beauty is in the harmonious selection of details."

Ad orientem worship (priest and people together facing "liturgical East") is a common feature of Ordinariate worship. The proper chants (Introit, Alleluia, Offertory and Communion) are retained and sung/chanted in a venerable form of English, a legitimate realization of the Council's permission to include the vernacular in the celebration of the Mass.

Divine Worship: the Missal (DW:M) is unique in the history of the Church. While DW:M faithfully translates indispensable Latin prayers such as the consecratory prayers, there is no official Latin Missal from which DW:M is translated. The venerable Anglican patrimony, which includes the initial translations into English of the Mass (1549 Book of Common Prayer, which predates the Tridentine reforms), translations made prior to the heterodoxical adaptations which crept in not long after Henry VIII's break with Rome, the laudable English Missal (1912), and the Book of Divine Worship celebrated among parishes of the Pastoral Provision prior to the formation of the Ordinariate, are the principal sources of DW:M.

That all said, the words of Stephen Bullivant once again come to mind:

(I)f you too are curious to see what Vatican II's stated ideal of the Tridentine Mass reformed — not replaced — "with new vigour to meet the circumstances and needs of modern times" (SC4) could, and on this evidence probably should, look like... then I suggest you contact your nearest Ordinariate and get yourself, and swiftly, to Divine Worship.