Article on Redemptionis Sacramentum by CWNews

Vatican, Apr. 19 (CWNews.com) - More than a full year after it was promised, the Vatican will unveil a document on "several things that must be observed and avoided regarding the Most Holy Eucharist" this Friday, April 23.

The Instruction Redemptionis Sacramentum will be released under the auspices of the Congregation for Divine Worship. Cardinal Francis Arinze (bio - news), the president of that Congregation, will chair a press conference introducing the new document. He will be accompanied by officials of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts; those two dicasteries were also involved in preparation of the Instruction.

When he released his encyclical, Ecclesia de Eucharistia, on April 16 of last year, Pope John Paul said that it would soon be followed by another document in which the Holy See would set forth disciplinary norms to govern liturgical abuse. That document apparently became the subject of a heated controversy among Vatican officials, and repeated drafts were required before the final version won approval.

In September 2003, a draft of the document appeared in the Italian press, accompanied by the report that some Vatican officials found the text too "conservative," and had demanded changes. After that highly unusual public exposure of disagreements within the Roman Curia, the document became the subject of persistent rumors, with several premature predictions that it would soon be ready for publication.

Informed Vatican sources say that Redemptionis Sacramentum in its published form will contain no important new norms, and the liturgical instructions in the new document will simply reflect the norms already published in the General Instructions for the Roman Missal.

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Link to article here.

Something seems to be missing. The Holy Father specifically asked for a document with "prescriptions of a juridical nature". Does this not mean a document with some sort of disciplinary penalties?

What purpose does document serve which only reprints selected norms from the GIRM or other documents?

I sincerely hope that this is not just another document to be ignored by those of the "do it yourself Mass" mentality. This mentality - this attitude has overcome far too many of the priests and guitar carrying 'liturgists' these past few decades.

We have only to be patient until Friday. Perhaps, there is more to the document that what we know so far. Perhaps, the rights of the faithful to a true liturgy as envisioned by the Church will become a reality for those who have had to endure the pain and suffering of illicit Sacraments for years.