Section VI Solitary Masses
"How can the priest say 'The Lord be
with you' when there are none to respond?" - Theodulf of Orléans (d. ~821)
(Church Quarterly Review, 1894, Vol. 37, p. 387)
Solitary Masses, where the priest is alone at the
Liturgy, are another innovation and improper practice of modern Roman
Catholicism.
The Roman Catholic professor John O'Brien (1841 - 1879)
writes:
Solitary Mass. - When Mass is said by a priest alone,
without the attendance of people, or even of a server, it is called a Solitary
Mass. Masses of this kind were once very common in monasteries and religious
communities (Bona, p. 230), and they are still practised to a great extent in
missionary countries. They cannot, however, be said without grave necessity;
for it is considered a serious offence by theologians to celebrate without a
server, and this server must be always a male, never a female, no matter how pressing
the necessity be.
Strangely enough, Solitary Masses were forbidden in days
gone by by several local councils, and this principally for the reason that it
seemed ridiculous to say "Dominus vobiscum," the Lord be with you; "Oremus,"
let us pray; and "Orate fratres," pray, brethren, when
there were no persons present. The Council of Mayence, held in the time of Pope
Leo III. (A.D. 815), directly forbade a priest to sing Mass alone. The
prohibition not merely to sing it, but to celebrate at all without witnesses,
was repeated by the Council of Nantes, and for the reasons alleged. Gratian
cites a canon in virtue of which two witnesses at least were required for the
due celebration of every Mass; and this we find to be the rule among the early
Cistercians.
Cardinal Bona (Rer. Liturg., p. 230), from whom we copy
these remarks, seems much in doubt as to whether Solitary Masses were wholly
abrogated in his day. He instances, however, a well-known exception in case of
a certain monastery which enjoyed the privilege from the Holy See of
celebrating without having any person to respond.
According to the present discipline of the Church,
whenever necessity compels a priest to celebrate alone, he must recite the
responses himself, and otherwise act as if he had a full congregation listening
to him. He must not omit, abridge, add, or change anything to suit the peculiar
circumstances of the occasion, but must do everything that the rubrics
prescribe for ordinary Mass, and this under pain of sin. (John O. Brien, A History
of the Mass and Its Ceremonies in the Eastern and Western Church, CH. I, pp.
8-9, New York, NY: Benziger Brothers,. 15th Ed., [1895?] (Same in first edition
of 1879))
John Henry Hopkins (1792 - 1868), a learned bishop of the
Protestant Episcopal communion in America, writes in reply to a Roman
controversialist:
Thus, in the Capitular of Theodulf, the Bishop of Aurelia
[Orleans], A. D. 797, we find the following plain testimony against solitary
Masses :-
"The priest should by no means celebrate the Mass
alone; because, as it cannot be celebrated without the salutation of the
priest, with the response of the people, so it ought not to be celebrated by
one. For there must be those around him, whom he may salute, and by whom the
response may be given to him, and he must remember the saying of our Lord: Wherever
two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them."*
Again, in a Council held by order of Charlemagne, A. D.
813, Canon xliii., we read these words :-
"No presbyter, in our judgment, can rightly perform
the Mass alone. For how shall he say, The Lord be with you, or how shall he
give the admonition, Lift up your hearts, and many others similar to these,
when there is no other person present with him?"‡
Again, in another collection of Canons, we have the
following :-
"It is decreed that none of the presbyters shall
presume to celebrate Mass alone because neither the words of our Lord and
Saviour, nor the writings of the Apostle Paul, declare it, nor is it found in
the Acts of the Apostles, that it ought to be so done in any wise. This custom,
therefore, so contrary to Apostolic and ecclesiastical authority, must be
eradicated, and thoroughly extirpated by the priests of the Lord; and if anyone
shall hereafter presume to do this thing, he shall be liable to
degradation."☨
And again, in the 6th Council of Paris, held by the
Bishops of all the Provinces, A. D. 829, the 48th Canon repeats the same
prohibition, decreeing, "that none of the presbyters shall presume to celebrate
the Mass alone; and if any should transgress this rule, he should be subject to
canonical correction."§
A multitude of similar proofs might be added, to
demonstrate that solitary Masses were held to be absurd and unlawful by the
Church of Rome herself for at least nine centuries.
And yet, in the face of Scripture, reason and authority,
your last great Council of Trent passed the following decree, in A. D. 1562
:-** "If any one shall say that Masses, in which the priest alone communicates
sacramentally, are unlawful and ought to be abolished, LET HIM BE
ANATHEMA."
So that here we have your unchangeable Church pronouncing
her solemn curse upon the very doctrine which she publicly maintained so late
as the ninth century! Is not this, most Reverend Sir, another evidence of the
candor with which your writers boast of your unity? Are the "variations of
Protestantism" more extraordinary than the variations of Rome? If
your deluded but honest-minded laity knew the history of their own Church, how
soon would they insist upon a thorough reformation, and abandon that figment of
infallibility which, when it is analyzed, resolves itself into a set of dissolving
views, shifted at the dictate of expediency!
[Hopkins's Footnotes:]
* Hard. Con., Tom. 4, p. 914.
† Ib., p. 1015.
☨ Ib., p.
1308
§ Ib., p. 1324.
** Hard. Con., Tom. 10, p. 129.1 (“George,” Errors
of the Latins: Notes on the Differences Between Traditional Roman Catholicism
and the Eastern Orthodox Church, and an Analysis of Their Historical Controversies
[June 25, 2021], 86-87)
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