Dominican Rite Latin Mass
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    I am going to be attending a Dominican Rite EF Mass here in town this Saturday, and I was wondering if anyone could tell me how that Rite differs from the Tridentine Mass. I read that it will be a Missa Cantata. I guess that means some of it will be chanted, but not all of it, and not a four hymn sandwich either.

    I am going to bring a small group of people to come with me, Orthodox friends who have only ever had experience with happy clappy Catholic liturgy (or perhaps no experience with Catholic liturgy at all). All I have in order to follow along with the prayers in the EF is my Parish Book of Chant. I need to know when to skip what, and when other prayers come into the picture, so that I don't get lost in the thing while the Mass is going on. I've had a year of Latin so I can follow along all right if I'm familiar with the texts beforehand.

    If everything goes well, I'm going to ask how one goes about joining their schola or another similar schola in the area. (I've seen pictures. It's a mixed one.)

    Any help is appreciated! Wikipedia has a little discussion about what's different, but I'm not that brushed up on liturgy to fully decipher it.
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,157
    Perhaps the best-known detail about the Dominican Rite is that the priest does not say, "Lord, I am not worthy..." ("Domine, non sum dignus..."); the flippant O.P. interpretation of this difference is that, being Dominicans, they *are* worthy. :-)
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    What does he say, then? (if you're not 100% joking)
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,157
    That will have to be answered by someone who's attended (or at least read) the rite: i.e., not me! I'm just going on the little that my more experienced friends have reported.
  • Dan F.Dan F.
    Posts: 205
    Might some of these Dominican Rite liturgical documents help? :)

    http://www.musicasacra.com/dominican-liturgy/
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    I was looking through them, but most of them are in Latin (and it's the English I need), and the thing that says it's an ordinary for Low Mass, all it has is instructions for when to bow your head or whatever, and I couldn't find any prayers in it. It's all just rubrics.

    If I had to grab out a Latin document and compare it to my PBC I could do that maybe, but I'd still need to be pointed in the right direction and know what to look out for. That way at least I would be able to find the English for whatever the two rites have in common.
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    Update: I went this Saturday, and it was BEAUTIFUL.

    The entire Mass was chanted, including the Creed--which about half the congregation sang, and they were pretty good! Almost all the congregation sang the rest of the ordinaries, which went like this:

    - Kyrie: Mass XVI
    - Gloria: Missa de Angelis
    - Creed: Credo III
    - Sanctus: Deus Genitor alme
    - Agnus Dei: same
    - Ite Missa est: Missa de Angelis

    Only men sang the propers, and the Asperges Me at the beginning, and the Salve Regina at the end. So I guess there's no reason for me to inquire about joining any choir for them... in the congregation I sing just as much as I would in the loft anyway.

    Turns out that all the liturgical differences between the Roman Rite and Dominican Rite are either purely rubrical, or happen in the prayers the priest prays silently at the altar, so it all turned out to be a non-issue. They provided English translations of the propers and the readings for the day, so the only thing I needed to do for my friends was show them the English translations of the Ordinaries from the PBC (and I also let them look over the Canon and Eucharistic Prayer during a silent part of the Mass). Now a few more people in the world realize that Catholic liturgy can be beautiful, and has not all been protestantized! Yay! The Orthodox friends I brought also thought it was beautiful. Gregorian Chant just has that effect on people.

    It's too bad that this beautiful liturgy is only celebrated once a month. I'll be there every month, though, without fail--they can count on that. I'm going to practice Credo III, too.

    I did spend some time comparing my PBC to a Latin document of the Dominican Rite, and I think I understand where a lot of the substantial differences are... again, all in silent prayers. Mostly I think they just cut out a lot of the offertory and a few other parts of the Mass, and they rearrange some things. The biggest differences occur during a Low Mass, but this was a Missa Cantata, so again, not much difference.

    Except that the celebrant was dressed as a Dominican. Hood (amice?) and everything. Fabulous.
  • Gilbert
    Posts: 106
    Lucky! I bet it was cooler than the mariachi Mass I went to today. Dominicans rock! Isn't their chant a little bit different? I thought it was. Does anyone know?
  • JamJam
    Posts: 636
    At the Mass, the chant was all as you'd expect it, except the Salve Regina was in a kind of monastic form that wasn't in the PBC.
  • chonakchonak
    Posts: 9,157
    Yes, the OPs have their own variety of the Salve melody. I went to a Dominican third-order group's meetings a few times and never got used to that.
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