Having bought a webcam, I have done a training video on the “mechanics” of celebrating the Sarum low Mass. I never feel at ease being filmed and recorded, so I ask you to be forgiving of my hesitations of speech and formulating ideas.
This is a training session and not an actual Mass.
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| David Llewellyn Dodd… on Hiatus |
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The Blue Flower 
Thank you for this most instructive video of the Use of Sarum. You have a lovely chapel, and I can see you have done a lot of work setting it up. Could you please expand on laying the chalice on its side on the paten at the final ablutions? I think you said it is something you are not clear about. What is the rubric that covers this? Is this instead of wiping the chalice with the purificator as in the Roman use?
Thanks for the kind words. Warren’s translation of the rubric reads: “After receiving the ablution, the priest shall place the chalice on the paten, so that if anything remain [in the former’] it may drain off [on to the latter]. And afterwards, inclining himself, he shall say.” I have heard it said that the purificator was not used in the Use of Sarum. Did the priest lick the drops off the paten? I read something in the Council of Trent from a commission describing pre-Reformation abuses. One was the priest licking the paten! I have simply adopted the Roman practice for this – using a purificator and drying the chalice after the ablutions.
Many difficulties are resolved by comparison with the Dominican rite. Unfortunately, many French diocesan uses were butchered in the 18th century and the Tridentine ordo missae put in. This is true of the Vintimille Parisian missal and a Rouen missal I have from the same era.
I wonder if this has something to do with chalice shape? With a “tulip” shaped chalice the tendency is for any remaining liquid to drip out onto the paten, however I find with a more Mediaeval style chalice, with a wide bowl, the drops of liquid actually collect just inside the rim of the chalice and therefore can be easily drunk leaving the chalice almost dry.
Good point. Also the foot of a medieval chalice is shaped to stop it from rolling. My baroque chalice has a round foot and, as you say, a tulip cup. Also, as you say, the quantity of liquid remaining is minute – especially if the second ablution is taken slowly to allow all the liquid (small amount of wine and larger proportion of water) to be drunk. I still remain very attached to my purificator from my Roman rite days!
Father,
Thank you for posting the new videos. I have two questions. Are you familiar with the custom of a using a second corporal instead of the pall to cover the sacred vessels and also the use of a Pax-Brede?
Indeed, I need to look into the second corporal instead of the pall. Either the folded corporal which would have been the origin of a rigid pall, or some kind of “tent” drawn up from the back of the chalice. I have seen medieval depictions of this, but can’t find one for now.
I don’t have a pax-brede, but they can be found in Normandy – either scrounge one from a church where they don’t know what it is or find one in an antique shop. It is kissed after the chalice.
Plate 30 of “The Parson’s Handbook” shows a large corporal drawn up over the chalice.
… that large corporal being the covering prescribed in the 1662 BCP for the consecrated elements not yet consumed (as this consumption is there directed to come after the final blessing). None of this is actual Sarum usage as the ablutions in Sarum occur (as in the Roman rite) immediately after communion. That picture is a part of the “Sarumish” application made by Dearmer of traditional usage applied to the BCP liturgy.
The illustrations are reproductions (without the colours) of images of what I would assume to be the 15th century. That Dearmer called the service “The Lord’s Supper” instead of the Eucharist or Mass is irrelevant. Otherwise, Dearmer would have provided a modern (early 20th century) drawing or a photograph. You are right in that the ablutions in Sarum follow the Communion and the prayer of thanksgiving (the Sarum one of course) – like in the Roman rite, English Missal, etc.
I saw a video several years ago in which the priest (Milan Synod) used the folded corporal which was larger than the one under the vessels,perhaps twenty four inches square. When not placed over the sacred vessels it lay folded, like a lady’s fan, behind the first corporal and in front of the crucifix. For a Pax-Brede, I have a silver icon of the Crucifixion, approximately three by five inches in size, which I think would do nicely. My English translation of Sarum is a reprint of an 1866 edition by Charles Walker, I have not compared it to the Warren translation.
Thank you, Fr, for demonstrating the beauty of the Sarum Use. If only I were permitted to adopt it! Many of the Rubrics, at least, can be applied to a Prayer Book celebration, and perhaps it is time for me to shift from praying Roman secrets to Sarum.
If you are using the Prayer Book, Dearmer’s The Parson’s Handbook is the one for you. There is also an Altar Book with the Prayer Book rite and rubrics by Dearmer. Which Church do you belong to?
Thank you for this. I look forward to additional videos.
Fascinating! The overriding lesson I drew from it is non-fussiness. Thank you for taking so much trouble.
I had my dose of fussiness when I was with the Institute of Christ the King! I like sobriety and simplicity without banality.
Fr Anthony,
Would you say that this issue of “fussiness” was simply the tradition at the Institute of Christ the King? I only really know the Roman usage and the Anglican Missal tradition, and personally I have not found it to be fussy at but actually quite sober and refined.
Actually, in Fr Quoëx’s day, it was truly the Roman tradition in its harmony and sobriety, more in the spirit of the Renaissance rather than the late baroque period. The most fussy has been some of the Anglo-Catholic “spikes” in London and the English south coast. It isn’t the rite itself but more the attitude of the priest, ministers and servers.
Sorry, I couldn’t reply above?
I would do the ablutions slightly differently. My reading of the rubrics is that the first ablution is wine and water over the fingers, the second some wine in the chalice into which the fingers are dipped whilst saying the “Haec nos communio…”, then drunk and the chalice lain on the paten as discussed above. The disadvantage of this is that when saying the “Adoremus crucis …” and going to the credence to wash the fingers, they are still wet with wine. This seems to be the rubric in Dickinson but Wickham Legg does not go into this detail?
I simply love your chapel. Thank you Father for sharing so much with us, especially the instruction for offering the Sarum rite.