E SACRIFICE OF THE MASS

APPENDIX.
THE LANGUAGE OF THE MASS.
THE Church s services may
be classed under two
heads : liturgical and extra-liturgical. By liturgical
services I mean here pre-eminently the Holy Mass,
and next the Office recited by priests and monks, also
all services in the Roman Missal, Breviary, Pontifical,
and Ritual. Such services are official. By extra-
liturgical services are meant the additional hymns,
prayers, and devotions found in popular manuals and
approved by the Bishop of the diocese. Liturgical
services are prescribed and regulated by the Holy See
alone ; they are the same everywhere, at least in the
Western Church, and continue through the centuries
substantially unchanged. Extra-liturgical services are
subject to the revision, direction, and approval of the
Ordinary : they
differ much at different times and in
different countries.
The extra-liturgical services are wont to be in the
vernacular of the country where they are in use, but
the liturgical services are always in Latin in the
Churches of the Western rite. We say of the Western
rite, for, strictly speaking, the Church has no language
distinctively her own. If at this moment she obliges