Pope Francis Celebrates Surprise "ad Deum" Mass --- Greeting From Secretary of State Parolin?

(Vatican) Francis Pope celebrated a surprise Holy Mass last Thursday over the grave of Pope John Paul II, which has drawn some attention. The Pope has celebrated ad Deum for the first time.

The celebration was held in the side chapel of St. Peter's Basilica, in which the body of John Paul II was reburied after his beatification, from the Crypt of the Popes below the main nave. There's no people's altar in the side chape. Such, however, Pope Francis could have been put back as easily as he had placed it in the Sistine Chapel, when he celebrated on the day after his election for the cardinals gathered for his first Mass as pope.

Attention was paid to the direciton of celebration because Pope Francis, when compared to his predecessor Benedict XVI., is considered little sensitive to liturgy and looks with some distrust on the part of the Church, which is committed to the traditional liturgy and tradition.

At the celebration is ad Deum completely normal for all Privatzelebrationen in St. Peter's Basilica, which take place on the side altars. The clothing of his concelebrants leads to a lack of liturgical sensibility open mind. "The act of the pope is neither blatantly something special. And yet it is of importance. If he does not ad Deum would want to celebrate, a word from him would have been enough to get put down a table, forgiveness, a refectory. So we consider it merit and as a gesture of good will," said Messa in Latino.

The Spanish Catholic Church historian and blogger Francisco de la Cigoña wonders if it is a signal to the traditionalists. The gesture would be, says de la Cigoña, in continuity with the greeting message to the Second International Pilgrimage to Rome, which had its culmination in the Pontifical Mass in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman rite in St. Peter on October 26th.

De la Cigoña was astonished here that the greeting message was signed by the new Secretary of State, Curial Archbishop Pietro Parolin on behalf of the Pope, although he could not take possession of his post for health reasons. It's a sign that the offices of the State Secretariat to continue working in a familiar form, though the Church is currently without a Secretary of State. Monsignor Parolin is still for convalescence in his home in northern Italy. What appears so far is the first and only official act of Archbishop Parolin, it probably had been asked like this for by the Pope himself. Otherwise, the procedure is hardly explicable, says de la Cigoña.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi

Image: Messa in Latino / Osservatore Romano

Link katholisches... AMGD