What are your thoughts on this?

Bleh. Ugh. UGHHHGHHGHHH.

What are your thoughts on this?

Take our pope...please!

Does "populo Dei" imply that only Christians are to be selected? This will be deemed insufficiently inclusive for some tastes.

It is allowed, but it is not required that women be present. Most parish churches have been doing it for years anyway.

Also, knowing the provisions for the EF liturgy, that liturgy is to be performed according to the norms in place in 1962 so it will not be forced upon Latin Mass Communities.

For those who don't know, the use of incense at the Missa Cantata (Sung Mass without Deacon and Subdeacon) was a liturgical abuse for many years which became regularised. In fact, the Missa Cantata was a compromise between Low Mass (Missa Lecta) and High Mass (Missa Solemnis) as with a shortage of clergy in some places, the rules at the time meant that if one minister was missing, that they were not allowed to sing at all.

Hartley martin,

You raise an interesting point, in what I take to be an attempt to make this decree no big deal.

Here's the problem with your attempt. Not all disobedience to rubric is created equal. I think you will find that using incense at the Missa Cantata was an attempt to retain in the Missa Cantata what had been required in the Missa Solemnis. A similar idea probably appertains with the Low Mass with Organ. That is: the goal is to elevate a liturgical form and the hearts and the minds of the people. Every single change(confirmed abuse) in the Mass since 1965 has had the opposite intent: to focus more on man than on God, on the functional rather than the transcendent, on the immanent rather than the eternal, on change for change's sake rather than love of the truth, to make God, when He is considered at all, seem safe and comfortable and -- dare I say it, harmless. (Yes, I'm happy defending that thesis, and if Chonak wishes, we can devote a new thread to it, or we can take it off-line).

This latest decree won't bring anyone closer to God. People who wanted women to have their feet washed have been acting in disobedience for years. People who have wanted this also have more changes they wish to make, even more frightening. Those who have tried to adhere to the truth may become disheartened. Thank the Good Lord that the EF isn't impacted by this novelty, and that those of us who wish to retain the custom of the past will be joined in this effort by those who feel abused by the utter disregard shown to the faithful and to the faith of our fathers. Let us offer up acts of reparation.

Indeed, chonak, we’ve already seen the Roman pontiff wash a Muslim girl’s feet.

Marajoy,

More than one person reading this decree will come to the conclusion that the foot washing has to do with the ordained priesthood, and that Pope Francis has just given the green light to the ordination of women. I don't know that this is the intention of His Holiness, but claims that discipline don't have doctrinal implications are wearing thin.

My thoughts on this is that question is now resolved in the Ordinary Form with a promulgation of a clarification by the CDW. The matter is settled at present.

Opinions can vary as to whether or not it should have been done at all, or rather to insist on the rubric of viri selecti, but that is not the case.

It also will ease the consciences of some liturgists who sometimes hold their breath when asking one's pastor or ordinary about the constituency of the group chosen for the Mandatum.

What Johnmann said. It is now possible to not break the liturgical law when doing what your parish might well have been doing anyway.

It would be much more disturbing if the washer was mandated to be a layperson, or if the washing were to be now mutual. Once I saw a "mandatum" in which each person in the "queue" got hands washed by the one ahead, then washed the hands of the one behind. That far more surely erases the historical meaning of this action, which is baptismal and "hierarch humbly serving subjects". Its meaning as "senior cleric humbly serving junior clerics" is a rather later development.

The writing is on the wall. "The only thing we will have left is the rosary and..."

I have several times witnessed women already in their chairs when they realized they were wearing panty hose. At least once, she then gave up her place and a substitute was quickly pressed into service. Once some truly embarrassing squirming went on, and I think ultimately her foot was "washed" through the stocking.
I have also seen a young woman who obviously didn't realize quite how short her skirt was until she was sitting in one of a row of chairs somewhat elevated above the nave and her elderly pastor knelt in front of her. Much squirming and tugging of hems and careful placement of hands ensued.
I have left Church when TPTB tried to insist that everyone needed to come up and have at least their hands washed and then wash someone elses.
(I thought that was why God invented Purell...)
This too shall pass.
I am glad for once that my present pastor is a.... liturgical minimalist? Yes, let's put it that way.

(Save the Liturgy, Save the World)

Putting aside the debate over whether mandatum should exist at the parish level at all, mandatum traditionally involved the laity.

Really? My understanding is that pre-1955, the rite was only carried out in the religious context in the pontifical liturgy (with priests), or the monastic liturgy (with monks or nuns). I'd consider the civil Maundy ceremonies to be a separate, though related thing.

I've never appreciated being the part of the "mob" and having to say the Jews' reply to Pilate's hand-washing.

Hartley martin,

You raise an interesting point, in what I take to be an attempt to make this decree no big deal.

Don't pick on Hartley, Chris, you don't know his intentions. He's just reporting facts in his location. It isn't a matter of making a big or small deal out of this. None of us can do a thing about it.

Charles,

I'm not picking on Hartley. This was the most generous reading I could give to what he said.

Some changes are bigger than others. Brown shoes vs. red shoes isn't huge. The way some people go on about it makes these people usually look ridiculous, as the war over snowflakes on red cups made other people look foolish. Changing the liturgy is never a small matter, because it's the Church's public worship of God.

Was that supposed to be purple?

Kathy,

The problem with the Eye of the Tiber is that satire is getting harder and harder to write! Absurdity passes satire/parody in our modern era.

The entire issue is passing strange, and I confess that I need to be educated about it. From the comments, it seems to me that the proverbial horse has been out of the barn for decades now. Perhaps an abuse which the hierarchy is unable or unwilling to contain is receiving the imprimatur of lazy shepherds. As a person born post Pio XII, I would greatly appreciate a description of the rite as it ought to be done, or perhaps to be pointed toward a document which details how it was done.

Being Byzantine puts me a very small step away from Orthodoxy. I am closer to them than to Rome. If it gets too crazy, I at least have an out. Maybe Francis (our Francis, not the other one) will pray that rosary for new leadership and a revival of Latin Catholicism.

What would a revival of Latin Catholicism entail?

Francis (our Francis, not the other one)

Francesco non Papa?

He calls it what it is-an innovation-and it seems he really is emphasizing that the Pope wanted it. Interesting.

So tell me again, the document says
... exactly how many are to participate?
... and who are they to be?

@CharlesW

Restoration of the liturgy as sacred, heaven on earth, beautiful, and using only the best to do the best - not the prevailing tackiness.

Come to our abbey (Benedictine, Solesmes Congregation). All in the OF, all as SC intended (Gregorian chant, vernacular where appropriate and Latin or Greek otherwise, Latin Lauds and Vespers and with great attention to liturgical detail).

It can be done with the current liturgy. All that is lacking is the will, in most places.

Chris, keep in mind that it isn't my liturgy, I just work in it. I do the best I can with it, and it is far better than in many other places.

Its form is fixed. The problem is priests and people not following the forms. It has more options than the EF, but so what? Those options have limitations on them when accurately followed.